Introduction

Urban settings have always been a hotbed of language variation and change. The new styles and varieties which emerge in the dynamic linguistic contexts that characterise these countries exist alongside the typically extensive code-switching that is also characteristic of these societies. The new styles and varieties which emerge in the dynamic linguistic contexts that characterise these countries exist alongside the typically extensive code-switching that is also characteristic of these societies. In Africa, urban contact dialects often take the form of mixed varieties, characterised by lexis from multiple source languages and a morphosyntactic base founded on an urban, nonstandard version of one of the more widely spoken languages. In both the Global North and Global South, the linguistic creativity described earlier involves new patterns of language variation and change, drawing on existing, language-internal tendencies as well as the special linguistic dynamics of language contact settings. The chapter also presents an overview on the key concepts discussed in this book.