Haitian Creole, Albert Valdman - Equinox Publishing

Albert Valdman [+–]

Indiana University

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Albert Valdman is director of the Creole Institute at Indiana University and is a leading international specialist in French-based creoles. He is the author of one of the major works in the field, Le Créole: Structure, statut et origine (1978) and basic reference works for Louisiana Creole and Haitian Creole, in particular, the Haitian Creole-English Bilingual Dictionary (2007).

Haitian Creole presents a comprehensive view of the structure and development of Haitian Creole. It provides a detailed analysis of the phonology and grammar of the language, and points out key differences between these two fundamental aspects of the language and corresponding features of French. The book contains a detailed description of the productive strategies of vocabulary development, and deals with the origin of the lexicon of Haitian Creole. A signal innovation compared to other descriptions of the language is the treatment of linguistic variation, both geographical dialects and variation determined by social factors, as well as the presentation of earlier forms of Haitian Creole as attested by texts from the colonial period. Another major contribution is the discussion of language planning issues—the development of an autonomous systematic orthography and the standardization of the language—and related ones concerning the role of Haitian Creole in education and its status relative to the other officially recognized language of Haiti, French.

Preliminaries

In Memoriam [+–] viii-ix

Haitian Creole is the creole language with the largest number of speakers: about eight million in Haiti and two million in diaspora communities, in the United States, the Bahamas, Canada, and overseas French departments Guadeloupe, Martinique and French Guyana. Haitian Creole presents a comprehensive view of the structure and development of Haitian Creole. It provides a detailed analysis of the phonology and grammar of the language, and points out key differences between these two fundamental aspects of the language and corresponding features of French. The book contains a detailed description of the productive strategies of vocabulary development, and deals with the origin of the lexicon of Haitian Creole. A signal innovation compared to other descriptions of the language is the treatment of linguistic variation, both geographical dialects and variation determined by social factors, as well as the presentation of earlier forms of Haitian Creole as attested by texts from the colonial period. Another major contribution is the discussion of language planning issues—the development of an autonomous systematic orthography and the standardization of the language—and related ones concerning the role of Haitian Creole in education and its status relative to the other officially recognized language of Haiti, French.

Preface [+–] x-xv

Haitian Creole is the creole language with the largest number of speakers: about ten million in Haiti and two million in diaspora communities in North American, France, and the Caribbean, including the Dominican Republic, Cuba, and the French overseas departments. Haitian Creole presents a comprehensive view of the structure and development of Haitian Creole. It provides a detailed analysis of the phonology and grammar of the language and points out key differences between these two fundamental aspects of the language and corresponding features of French, its original target language. The book contains a detailed description of the productive strategies of vocabulary development and deals with the origin of Haitian Creole, as well as its relationship to the other French-based creoles in Louisiana, the Caribbean, French Guiana, and the Indian Ocean. A signal innovation with regard to other descriptions of the language is the treatment of linguistic variation, both in geographical dialects and variation as determined by social factors, as well as the presentation of earlier forms of Haitian Creole, as attested by texts from the Colonial period. Another major contribution is the discussion of language planning and related issues concerning the use of Haitian Creole in education and its status relative to French, the other officially recognized language of Haiti.

Acknowledgements [+–] xvi-xviii

Introduction [+–] 1-58

Chapter 1 opens with a general discussion of the difference between pidgin and creole languages. It then situates Haiti in the Caribbean and provides a short sketch of the history of the Republic of Haiti, with an emphasis on the French colonial period and a key event: the nineteen-year American Occupation. There follows a brief mention of the respective roles of French and Haitian Creole in Haiti and a list of the numerous linguistic studies bearing on the language, focusing on lexicographic resources. The final section of this lengthy chapter reviews the various French-based creoles in the Atlantic zone (Louisiana, the Caribbean, and French Guiana) and in the Indian Ocean (Réunion, Mauritius, Rodrigues, and the Seychelles), with a brief mention of Tayo, a potential creole language spoken in New Caledonia.

The Phonological System [+–] 59-78

Chapter 2 opens with a discussion of the notion of phonemic distinction. The consonant and vowel systems of HC are presented in comparison with the corresponding systems of French and English. The description of each of the two phonological subsystems of the language is tripartite: inventory of phonemes, articulatory details, and distributional features. For the vowels, special sections are devoted to the treatment of the nasal vowels and the front rounded vowels.

Variation in the Forms of Words [+–] 79-94

Chapter 3 deals with morphophonology, variation in the forms of words found in the speech of all speakers of Haitian Creole. These include short and long forms of personal pronouns, vowel reduction in verb forms, vowel blending, the variants of the definite determiner, and the complex set of phonological processes that affect post-nominal possessive determiners in Capois (northern Haiti), the local dialect.

Toward a Systematic Autonomous Spelling [+–] 95-138

Chapter 4 opens with a general consideration of the nature and function of orthographic systems. It continues with a discussion of the principles of phonologically based orthographies. Within the context of the presentation of early notations for Haitian Creole (HC) based on the traditional French spelling, a sample is offered of written texts I think from the colonial and immediate post-colonial periods which used that spelling. Next, the chapter reviews the three autonomous phonologically based orthographies devised for HC after 1940. It ends with the introduction of the concept of normalization in handling the morphophonological variation presented in Chapter 3.

The Structure of the Haitian Creole Lexicon [+–] 139-165

Chapter 5 starts with a general description of morphological structure. There follow sections on lexicogenetic processes in HC: derivation (a listing and illustration of about twenty productive suffixes and prefixes), compounding, onomatopoeia, and borrowing.

The Origin of the Haitian Creole Lexicon [+–] 166-188

Chapter 6 opens with a section that stresses the fact that the input to the creation of HC by the African slave population was Colonial French, a variety of the language highly distinct from Standard French. The next section presents the phonological processes that link forms of HC and French cognates; these are in fact the processes that account for differences between Colonial and Standard French. The next sections discuss the survival, in HC, of regional or vernacular French forms and semantic processes that have led to differences in meaning between HC forms and French cognates. The last section deals with the lexicon that originates in languages other than French.

Basic Sentence Structure [+–] 189-208

Chapter 7 opens with one of the central features of the language, the fact that many words serve multiple grammatical categories (multifunctionality). It then presents the structure of simple sentences: sentences formed with introducers, copula-type sentences, sentences with predicates containing transitive and intransitive verbs, and those with double objects. A section is devoted to middle verbs, which enter into constructions equivalent to French and English passive sentences. The final section deals with a notable structural feature of HC: the sentence-final emphatic markers wi and non.

The Verbal System [+–] 209-252

Chapter 8 begins with a discussion of the semantic information—tense, aspect, mood— carried by verbs. It continues with a presentation of the structural features that carry this information: verb markers and auxiliaries (verbs that, unlike verb markers, have more lexical than grammatical meaning and are related to autonomous verbs). Special consideration is given to the form pou that functions as a preposition, a verbal marker, and nominal and verbal complementizer. The final section presents serial verbs, a grammatical feature that is a salient feature of the HC verb system.

The Structure of Noun Phrases [+–] 253-287

Chapter 9 describes the structure of noun phrases. The first section presents their various constituents. The second section examines the semantic information conveyed by the various determiners and their functional role. It contains a detailed discussion of the semantics of the post-posed definite determiner and its extensive phonological variation. Another focus of this section is the syntactic expression of possession. The third section deals with personal and interrogative pronouns and the fourth with adjectives, their position in the noun phrase, and the expression of comparison. The chapter ends with the issue of sex reference in HC.

Complex sentences: Coordination, Subordination, and Clefting [+–] 288-314

Chapter 10 covers the structure of complex sentences. The first section describes conjoining clauses with the use of coordinating conjunctions. The second section deals with the various means of embedding clauses into the main clause: the complementation of the verb of the main clause with another verb, the use of conjunctions expressing cause, condition, manner, etc., and the modification of noun phrases of the main clause with relative clauses. It contains a detailed discussion of the expression of temporal relations between the verbs of main and dependent clauses. The third section describes the very complex processes involved in clefting and reduplication to effect emphasis on particular sentence elements.

Variation in Haitian Creole [+–] 315-356

Chapter 11 describes geographical and sociolinguistic variation. The chapter opens with a discussion of how geographical variation is studied. It then describes two major geographical variation studies conducted in Haïti. Special attention is given to the more thorough study, L’Atlas linguistique d’Haïti, that bears on 2,000 variable words and constructions. Various illustrative maps of particular variants are provided. The second part reviews the small body of research on sociolinguistic variation. Two particular studies are described: the first, a pilot study of a phonological change in progress, the extension of nasalization in the post-posed definite determiner; the second, an extensive study of the influence of the standard (Port-au-Prince) variety of HC on the most divergent geographical variety, that of northern Haiti: Capois. In addition, Chapter 11 compares the variety of standard HC spoken by monolingual speakers to kreyòl swa, the one heavily influenced by French that is spoken by bilingual members of higher social classes.

Language Planning and Language Choice in Education [+–] 357-394

Chapter 12 discusses language planning in Haiti and the relationship between French and HC in education. Two aspects of language planning are covered in the first section: status planning, in particular whether and how HC is mentioned in the various Haitian constitutions; corpus planning, the level to which HC is present in administration, education, and the media. The sections that follow describe to what extent monolingual speakers have access to French and the attitude of speakers, both monolingual and bilingual, toward the country’s two languages. The final section reviews the various governmental programs that aim to introduce HC into literacy training and basic education. In particular, it examines the implementation of the Bernard Reform that, in 1979, marked the official introduction of HC as an educational vehicle in the early grades of primary school.

The Genesis and Development of Haitian Creole [+–] 395-443

Chapter 13 opens with a presentation of the various hypotheses put forward to account for the genesis of creole languages. It begins with those that view it somewhat as an exceptional process—the Creole Prototype, the Bioprogram, and the Relexification theories . It follows with the Superstratist approach, which views HC as the unguided acquisition of Colonial French in the special social context of seventeenth- and eighteenth-century plantation colonies. The next section attempts to account for the relationship among the French-based creoles of the Atlantic zone, with the support of historical evidence and early texts, as well as consideration of vernacular varieties of French, particularly those of the Americas. The final section returns to the issue of transfer from African substrate languages espoused by the Relexification hypothesis, some involving congruence between structures of the substrate and Colonial French, others pointing to an apparent total transfer.

End Matter

References [+–] 444-465

Subject Index [+–] 466-473

Author Index [+–] 474-477

Reviews

There is no work that competes with the scope and thoroughness of Valdman's book. The author has built his academic career on the publication of eye-popping cornerstone reference works, and this tome is no exception. It is a vast edifice of learning that scholars and students can draw from, it greatly advances Haitian Creole linguistics, and it once again shows the unmatched leadership of Albert Valdman in Haitian Creole Studies.
Journal of French Language Studies

This major contribution, written by the world's most renowned specialist of Haitian Creole, is the most comprehensive study of the language. I thoroughly enjoyed reading [it]. I heartedly recommend it to students and senior linguists who are interested in Haitian Creole and Creole studies in general.
Anthropological Linguistics

The publication of this book is a welcome development for Creole Studies; carried out by one of its uncontested specialists, it is already a major reference work on Haitian Creole ... a language to which there was as yet no such complete study. (translated from the French original)
Journal of Language Contact

The generally very complete and detailed description of Haitian Creole will make this book a reference work in which one is likely to find information also on phenomena that other publications exclude for being peripheral. Most linguistic concepts are introduced with examples from both English and French and subsequently transferred to Haitian Creole with additional examples so that readers who don’t have a good command of Creole can ease into new terminology, moving from more familiar languages to new phenomena.

For future research, the enormous number of examples is one of the most important assets of the book since it will be possible to find excellent illustrations and an in-depth description for almost any structural phenomenon of Haitian Creole. The book will be helpful for researchers and students alike, and the affordable price of the paperback makes it available also for private purchase.
Sociolinguistic Studies

Fine-grained analysis like this is typical of Valdman's entire oeuvre, the essence of which is now available in this single monograph, one which I recommend highly.
Journal of Pidgin and Creole Languages

With well over 400 pages, the work provides a well-founded overview of the current state of research and our knowledge of French-based Creole languages, and especially of créole haïtien. It offers a successful summary for those familiar with the subject, a successful introduction to the subject for those not (yet) familiar with it, and a reading that is highly recommended.
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Haitian Creole

Structure, Variation, Status, Origin

Albert Valdman [+–]

Indiana University

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