When Nigerians say “see you next tomorrow” they mean the day after tomorrow. Crash courseįor those who haven’t grown up with the language, here’s a quick crash course: It’s no surprise that this common language has thrived in a country of 190 million in which more than 500 languages are spoken. The rapid rise of Nigerian pop culture with Afrobeat, a flourishing ‘Nollywood’ film industry and popular fiction by the likes of Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie have brought Pidgin English – a mix of English, words from local languages and street slang – to a wider audience.
Now, their unique brand of Pidgin English has gone mainstream with the announcement by the Oxford English Dictionary that it’s added 29 Nigerian colloquialisms to its latest edition. Nigerians have long taken English, the former colonial language, and made it their own.
