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Concept
Louisiana Creole
Summary
Louisiana Creole is a French-based creole language spoken by fewer than 10,000 people, mostly in the state of Louisiana. Also known as Kouri-Vini, it is spoken today by people who may racially identify as White, Black, mixed, and Native American, as well as Cajun and Creole. It should not be confused with its sister language, Louisiana French, a dialect of the French language. Many Louisiana Creoles do not speak the Louisiana Creole language and may instead use French or English as their everyday languages.
Due to the rapidly shrinking number of speakers, Louisiana Creole is considered an endangered language.
Louisiana was colonized by the French beginning in 1699, as well as Canadians who were forced out of Acadia around the mid-18th century. Colonists were large-scale planters, small-scale homesteaders, and cattle ranchers; the French needed laborers as they found the climate very harsh. They began to import enslaved Africans, as they had for workers on their Caribbean island colonies. It is estimated that, beginning about 1719, a total of 70,000 persons were transported from the Senegambia region of West Africa. These people originally spoke a Mande language related to Malinke. They were in contact with enslaved people speaking other languages, such as Ewe, Fon, and Igbo. The importation of enslaved people by the French regime continued until 1743.
The language developed in 18th-century Louisiana from interactions among speakers of the lexifier language of Standard French and several substrate or adstrate languages from Africa. Prior to its establishment as a creole, the precursor was considered a pidgin language. The social situation that gave rise to the Louisiana Creole language was unique, in that the lexifier language was the language found at the contact site. More often the lexifier is the language that arrives at the contact site belonging to the substrate/adstrate languages. Neither the French, the French-Canadians, nor the enslaved Africans were native to the area; this fact categorizes Louisiana Creole as a contact language that arose between exogenous ethnicities.
Official source
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