‘He’s black; I’ll speak to him in Chilapalapa’: Prickly Proximity and the Slow Death of a Colonial Pidgin in Zambia

This article examines the history of Chilapalapa, a colonial pidgin language, in Zambia. ‘Prickly proximity’ is used as a conceptual tool to understand the ways in which fraught yet intimate interracial relationships are managed by many of the white farming community of Zambia, who are at once privileged by their colonial past and bound by it. The article further discusses the history of the language before arguing that the patterns of linguistic learning among white Zambians, influenced by a frequent attempt to regulate emotional distance and hierarchy, created a situation in which Chilapalapa retained considerable prominence and power. This case study demonstrates the importance of language to ongoing processes of decolonisation, not only at the more widely researched national level, but also at the interpersonal one. This raises questions of inequality, belonging and race which are pertinent for other nations across southern Africa.