Let's Talk about Language

 

One of the most important, and darkest, chapters in the history of Martinique as we know it is the slave trade, which was triangular, like the Cap 110 monument.

I'm all in favor of making the most of one's situation, even if that situation is being bored out of one's mind on a beautiful Caribbean island for seven months. In that spirit, I am both alleviating my boredom and extending the knowledge gleaned from my degree in French and Francophone studies by taking a course on creole language and civilization here in Martinique.

I only started today (9 classes behind, because I was trying to wait until I was paid, which I still haven't been), but it was a good day to play catch up since only two people total showed up, due to the All Saint's vacation this week. The professor quickly caught me up on the creole alphabet and a few important points about grammar. I don't imagine that you're here to learn a new language, so I'll skip those bits (though you can use my créole flashcards, if that does interest you). However, as ignorance about colonial history and the current conditions of former colonies pervades the ""Western"" world, I will go ahead and share a few points that I gleaned from his lecture on Martiniquais people and their relationship to their creole.

The journey while fighting racism is hard enough to merit its own bench by the way.

This relationship is characterized, he argues, by four rejections. This creole was created quite rapidly as the lingua franca of the indigenous Caribbeans, white French people (who spoke francien of the French countryside, as formal French hadn't actually pervaded the whole country yet), and imported African slaves, between the years of roughly 1620-1670. Creole was considered the language of the slaves, the lowest class of society (the Caribbeans were being rapidly massacred). The French planters (habitants as they are called politely, or békés more commonly, though this term is considered something of a slur / derogatory term now, depending on who you ask) largely came from poorer, rural classes and were trying to move up in the world, so they rejected creole in favor of métropolitain French.

Because of what some might call most basic human nature, or what my former Native America professor called "the history of shagging", mixed-race individuals soon formed their own class on the island. They began to advocate for their own social and legal rights through French institutions, and, in order to succeed and be taken seriously, they, too, rejected creole in favor of French.

With the abolition(s) of slavery in the Nineteenth Century, former slaves and their children basically had the choice of continuing to work on plantations, fleeing into the mountains to start their own small farms, or trying to climb the social ladder through education. In schools, creole was (and continued to be until very recently, actually) not allowed, so anyone pursuing this path had to, again, reject creole in favor of French.

Finally, with the abolition of slavery, "manpower was imported" (a handy euphemism for skipping over complicated histories of class struggle, colonialism, and violation of human rights), especially from Southern India. These Indians, who were known as coolies (super not an okay word now, but it helps to know what it means), were actually not considered French citizens, despite remaining for generations, until 1922, at the end of a long legal struggle. At this point, they, too, basically had only education as a option for climbing the social hierarchy. You guessed it: they by and large chose to speak French rather than creole.

Élizé may be all about sharing
créole flavors with the world in
their Region, but they share their
anti-littering message in French,
which, here, is a choice.

What does all of this mean? Well, for starters, it means that creole is/was in trouble. Though creole is now taught in schools and even universities in Martinique, after several generations of it being formally prohibited in schools and hardly used in any professional setting, with many individuals neglecting, intentionally or not, to speak it in their personal lives, many feared that it would diminish in depth or even disappear. Nowadays, individuals and action groups host events, publish literature and dictionaries, and generally call people to action to preserve this part of local culture. Last week Martinique, along with several other islands, celebrated the International Day of Creole, with several events aiming at celebrating and developing the use of creole. I had the privilege of attending a presentation of creole crafts, poetry, and cakes (you can guess where my money went). 

Does that mean that locals have a purely positive view of creole? What does creole mean to locals who didn't speak it growing up but now feel pressured to learn it? How does the form it takes now differ due to insertions of both French and English? Lacking an Acadamie française, who decides how modern and technological terms are integrated?

I sure don't know, and I may never fully understand, but I intend to keep striving to understand.