Fiona Mc Laughlin is an Associate Professor of African Languages and Linguistics at the University of Florida, USA, where she currently heads a research project on the languages of urban Africa.

• Acknowledgements; Notes on Contributors: 1: Introduction to the languages of urban Africa, Fiona Mc Laughlin (University of Florida, USA); 2: The historical dynamic of multilingualism in Accra, M.E. Kropp Dakubu (University of Ghana-Legon, Ghana); 3: The Story of Old-Urban Vernaculars in North Africa, Atiqa Hachimi (University of Florida, USA); 4: The spread of Lingala as a lingua frame in the Congo basin, Eyamba G. Bokamba (University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, USA); 5: Senegal's Early Cities and the Making of an Urban Language, Fiona Mc Laughlin (University of Florida, USA); 6: Discourses, community, identity; Processes of linguistic homogenization in Bamako, Mali, Ce'cile Canut (CNRS-Paris, France); 7: The Multiple Facets of the Urban Language Form, Nouchi, Sabine Kube-Barth; 8: On assessing the ethnolinguistic vitality of Ga in Accra, James Essegbey (University of Florida, USA); 9: Multilingualism and language use in Porto Novo, Wale Adeniran (Obafemi Awolowo University, Nigeria); 10: Language choice in Dar es Salaam's billboards, Charles Bwenge (University of Florida, USA); 11: Innovations on the Fringes of the Kiswahili Speaking World, Haig Der-Houssikian (University of Florida, USA); 12: Polarizing and blending: compatible practices in a bilingual urban community in Cape Town, Kay McCormick (University of Cape Town, South Africa) References; Index.

‘McLaughlin's edited volume, at long last, provides us an opportunity to comprehend the multilingual complexity of Africa's growing urban communities.' - David Dwyer, Professor Emeritus, Michigan State University, USA