Pijin Language - Epenthesis

Epenthesis

Another linguistic phenomena that occurred in the transitions from English to Solomand Islands’ Pijin is the addition of vowels in the interior and final positions of a word. Like most languages in the Solomon Islands consonant clusters and consonant-final words do not occur in Pijin. Therefore, speakers of the language add vowels in between consonants in and word finally to adapt the English forms to Pijin grammar. The selection of the extra vowels is usually made in accordance with vowel harmony rules. For example, the word ‘business’ becomes bisinis or bisinisi (depending on the age and dialect of the Pijin speaker).