My WIP moves to Hawaii where the locals speak Pidgin. A lot of it is close to English (ovah dere for over there or Bo-da-dem for both of them). Phonetically, the reader can make out the meaning (or am I wrong to assume they will?)
Sample (can anyone tell me what you read in this)
"Ovah dere my baby braddah an sistah."
"Ah, dat cute."
"You dink eriding cute."
"You no like?"
The scenes with Pidgin are relatively short and the dialogue isn't excessive, mostly short phrases like above.
But certain words are completely foreign, like Akamai which is a smart person, or grind for eat. I've used these words sparingly because I didn't want to constantly be translating what one character said, nor leave the reader wondering "What?"
I read a book once that had a strong Scottish dialect, but the author had a note at the end of the book stating that excessive use of the dialect could be confusing for the reader so she'd limited the use and didn't go all crazy using it for every part of every sentence.
Do I have to explain my restrained use of Pidgin?
By the way, is anyone from Hawaii with a knowledge of Pidgin?
Sample (can anyone tell me what you read in this)
"Ovah dere my baby braddah an sistah."
"Ah, dat cute."
"You dink eriding cute."
"You no like?"
The scenes with Pidgin are relatively short and the dialogue isn't excessive, mostly short phrases like above.
But certain words are completely foreign, like Akamai which is a smart person, or grind for eat. I've used these words sparingly because I didn't want to constantly be translating what one character said, nor leave the reader wondering "What?"
I read a book once that had a strong Scottish dialect, but the author had a note at the end of the book stating that excessive use of the dialect could be confusing for the reader so she'd limited the use and didn't go all crazy using it for every part of every sentence.
Do I have to explain my restrained use of Pidgin?
By the way, is anyone from Hawaii with a knowledge of Pidgin?