Mobilian Jargon

Drawing on fieldwork and archival research, Drechsel presents a grammatical, sociolinguistic, and ethnohistorical study of Mobilian Jargon, a Muskogean-based American Indian pidgin of the Mississippi valley. Though linguistic and extralinguistic evidence points to Mobilian Jargon's pre-Columbian origin, it was primarily spoken between 1700 and the mid-twentieth century, when it functioned as a lingua franca among linguistically diverse southeastern Native American groups, and in contact between these groups and non-Indians. Drechsel's study questions the universality of some concepts developed in pidgin and creole linguistics, and carries significant implications for the ethnology of Native American peoples, and for the history of North America.