Creole (linguistics)
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A creole language, or simply creole, is a stable form of
contact language Language contact occurs when speakers of two or more languages or varieties interact with and influence each other. The study of language contact is called contact linguistics. Language contact can occur at language borders, between adstratum ...
that develops from the process of different languages simplifying and mixing into a new form (often a
pidgin A pidgin , or pidgin language, is a grammatically simplified form of contact language that develops between two or more groups of people that do not have a language in common: typically, its vocabulary and grammar are limited and often drawn f ...
), and then that form expanding and elaborating into a full-fledged language with
native speaker Native Speaker may refer to: * ''Native Speaker'' (novel), a 1995 novel by Chang-Rae Lee * ''Native Speaker'' (album), a 2011 album by Canadian band Braids * Native speaker, a person using their first language or mother tongue * Native spea ...
s, all within a fairly brief period. While the concept is similar to that of a mixed or hybrid language, creoles are often characterized by a tendency to systematize their inherited grammar (e.g., by eliminating irregularities). Like any language, creoles are characterized by a consistent system of
grammar In linguistics, grammar is the set of rules for how a natural language is structured, as demonstrated by its speakers or writers. Grammar rules may concern the use of clauses, phrases, and words. The term may also refer to the study of such rul ...
, possess large stable vocabularies, and are
acquired ''Acquired'' is a podcast by Ben Gilbert and David Rosenthal about business history and strategy. As of 2024, the podcast has more than 600,000 monthly listeners. History Gilbert and Rosenthal worked together at Madrona Venture Group and ini ...
by children as their native language. These three features distinguish a creole language from a pidgin. Creolistics, or creology, is the study of creole languages and, as such, is a subfield of
linguistics Linguistics is the scientific study of language. The areas of linguistic analysis are syntax (rules governing the structure of sentences), semantics (meaning), Morphology (linguistics), morphology (structure of words), phonetics (speech sounds ...
. Someone who engages in this study is called a creolist. The precise number of creole languages is not known, particularly as many are poorly attested or documented. About one hundred creole languages have arisen since 1500. These are predominantly based on European languages such as English and French due to the European
Age of Discovery The Age of Discovery (), also known as the Age of Exploration, was part of the early modern period and overlapped with the Age of Sail. It was a period from approximately the 15th to the 17th century, during which Seamanship, seafarers fro ...
and the
Atlantic slave trade The Atlantic slave trade or transatlantic slave trade involved the transportation by slave traders of Slavery in Africa, enslaved African people to the Americas. European slave ships regularly used the triangular trade route and its Middle Pass ...
that arose at that time. With the improvements in
ship-building Shipbuilding is the construction of ships and other floating vessels. In modern times, it normally takes place in a specialized facility known as a shipyard. Shipbuilders, also called shipwrights, follow a specialized occupation that traces i ...
and
navigation Navigation is a field of study that focuses on the process of monitoring and controlling the motion, movement of a craft or vehicle from one place to another.Bowditch, 2003:799. The field of navigation includes four general categories: land navig ...
, traders had to learn to communicate with people around the world, and the quickest way to do this was to develop a pidgin; in turn, full creole languages developed from these pidgins. In addition to creoles that have European languages as their base, there are, for example, creoles based on
Arabic Arabic (, , or , ) is a Central Semitic languages, Central Semitic language of the Afroasiatic languages, Afroasiatic language family spoken primarily in the Arab world. The International Organization for Standardization (ISO) assigns lang ...
,
Chinese Chinese may refer to: * Something related to China * Chinese people, people identified with China, through nationality, citizenship, and/or ethnicity **Han Chinese, East Asian ethnic group native to China. **'' Zhonghua minzu'', the supra-ethnic ...
, and Malay. The
lexicon A lexicon (plural: lexicons, rarely lexica) is the vocabulary of a language or branch of knowledge (such as nautical or medical). In linguistics, a lexicon is a language's inventory of lexemes. The word ''lexicon'' derives from Greek word () ...
of a creole language is largely supplied by the parent languages, particularly that of the most dominant group in the social context of the creole's construction. However, there are often clear
phonetic Phonetics is a branch of linguistics that studies how humans produce and perceive sounds or, in the case of sign languages, the equivalent aspects of sign. Linguists who specialize in studying the physical properties of speech are phoneticians ...
and
semantic Semantics is the study of linguistic Meaning (philosophy), meaning. It examines what meaning is, how words get their meaning, and how the meaning of a complex expression depends on its parts. Part of this process involves the distinction betwee ...
shifts. On the other hand, the grammar that has evolved often has new or unique features that differ substantially from those of the parent languages.


Overview

A creole is believed to arise when a
pidgin A pidgin , or pidgin language, is a grammatically simplified form of contact language that develops between two or more groups of people that do not have a language in common: typically, its vocabulary and grammar are limited and often drawn f ...
, developed by adults for use as a second language, becomes the native and primary language of their children – a process known as
nativization Nativization is the process through which in the virtual absence of native speakers, a language undergoes new phonological, morphological, syntactical, semantic and stylistic changes, and gains new native speakers. This happens necessarily when ...
. The
pidgin A pidgin , or pidgin language, is a grammatically simplified form of contact language that develops between two or more groups of people that do not have a language in common: typically, its vocabulary and grammar are limited and often drawn f ...
-creole life cycle was studied by American linguist Robert Hall in the 1960s. Some linguists, such as Derek Bickerton, posit that creoles share more grammatical similarities with each other than with the languages from which they are phylogenetically derived. However, there is no widely accepted theory that would account for those perceived similarities. Moreover, no grammatical feature has been shown to be specific to creoles. Many of the creoles known today arose in the last 500 years, as a result of the worldwide expansion of European maritime power and trade in the
Age of Discovery The Age of Discovery (), also known as the Age of Exploration, was part of the early modern period and overlapped with the Age of Sail. It was a period from approximately the 15th to the 17th century, during which Seamanship, seafarers fro ...
, which led to extensive
European colonial empires A colonial empire is a sovereign state, state engaging in colonization, possibly establishing or maintaining colony, colonies, infused with some form of coloniality and colonialism. Such states can expand contiguous as well as Territory#Overseas ...
. Like most non-official and minority languages, creoles have generally been regarded in popular opinion as degenerate variants or
dialect A dialect is a Variety (linguistics), variety of language spoken by a particular group of people. This may include dominant and standard language, standardized varieties as well as Vernacular language, vernacular, unwritten, or non-standardize ...
s of their parent languages. Because of that prejudice, many of the creoles that arose in the European colonies, having been stigmatized, have become
extinct Extinction is the termination of an organism by the death of its Endling, last member. A taxon may become Functional extinction, functionally extinct before the death of its last member if it loses the capacity to Reproduction, reproduce and ...
. However, political and academic changes in recent decades have improved the status of creoles, both as living languages and as object of linguistic study. Some creoles have even been granted the status of official or semi-official languages of particular political territories. Other scholars, such as
Salikoko Mufwene Salikoko S. Mufwene is a linguist born in Mbaya-Lareme in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. He is the Edward Carson Waller Distinguished Service Professor at the University of Chicago, where he holds appointments in the Department of Linguisti ...
, argue that pidgins and creoles arise independently under different circumstances, and that a pidgin need not always precede a creole nor a creole evolve from a pidgin. Pidgins, according to Mufwene, emerged in trade colonies among "users who preserved their native vernaculars for their day-to-day interactions". Creoles, meanwhile, developed in settlement colonies in which speakers of a European language, often
indentured servants Indentured servitude is a form of labor in which a person is contracted to work without salary for a specific number of years. The contract called an "indenture", may be entered voluntarily for a prepaid lump sum, as payment for some good or ser ...
whose language would be far from the standard in the first place, interacted extensively with non-European
slave Slavery is the ownership of a person as property, especially in regards to their labour. Slavery typically involves compulsory work, with the slave's location of work and residence dictated by the party that holds them in bondage. Enslavemen ...
s, absorbing certain words and features from the slaves' non-European native languages, resulting in a heavily
basilect A post-creole continuum (or simply creole continuum) is a dialect continuum of varieties of a creole language between those most and least similar to the superstrate language (that is, a closely related language whose speakers assert or asserted ...
alized version of the original language. These servants and slaves would come to use the creole as an everyday vernacular, rather than merely in situations in which contact with a speaker of the superstrate was necessary.


History


Etymology

The English term ''creole'' comes from
French French may refer to: * Something of, from, or related to France ** French language, which originated in France ** French people, a nation and ethnic group ** French cuisine, cooking traditions and practices Arts and media * The French (band), ...
, which is
cognate In historical linguistics, cognates or lexical cognates are sets of words that have been inherited in direct descent from an etymological ancestor in a common parent language. Because language change can have radical effects on both the s ...
with the Spanish term and Portuguese , all descending from the verb ''criar'' ('to breed' or 'to raise'), all coming from Latin . The specific sense of the term was coined in the 16th and 17th century, during the great expansion in European maritime power and trade that led to the establishment of European colonies in other continents. The terms and were originally qualifiers used throughout the Spanish and Portuguese colonies to distinguish the members of an ethnic group who were born and raised locally from those who immigrated as adults. They were most commonly applied to nationals of the colonial power, e.g. to distinguish (people born in the colonies from Spanish ancestors) from (those born in the Iberian Peninsula, i.e. Spain). However, in Brazil the term was also used to distinguish between (blacks born in Brazil from African slave ancestors) and (born in Africa). Over time, the term and its derivatives (Creole, Kréol, Kreyol,
Kreyòl Haitian Creole (; , ; , ), or simply Creole (), is a French-based creole languages, French-based creole language spoken by 10 to 12million people worldwide, and is one of the two official languages of Haiti (the other being French), where it ...
, Kriol, Krio, etc.) lost the generic meaning and became the proper name of many distinct ethnic groups that developed locally from immigrant communities. Originally, therefore, the term "creole language" meant the speech of any of those
creole peoples Creole peoples may refer to various ethnic groups around the world. The term's meaning exhibits regional variations, often sparking debate. Creole peoples represent a diverse array of ethnicities, each possessing a distinct cultural identity tha ...
.


Geographic distribution

As a consequence of colonial European trade patterns, most of the known European-based creole languages arose in coastal areas in the equatorial belt around the world, including the
Americas The Americas, sometimes collectively called America, are a landmass comprising the totality of North America and South America.''Webster's New World College Dictionary'', 2010 by Wiley Publishing, Inc., Cleveland, Ohio. When viewed as a sing ...
, western
Africa Africa is the world's second-largest and second-most populous continent after Asia. At about 30.3 million km2 (11.7 million square miles) including adjacent islands, it covers 20% of Earth's land area and 6% of its total surfac ...
,
Goa Goa (; ; ) is a state on the southwestern coast of India within the Konkan region, geographically separated from the Deccan highlands by the Western Ghats. It is bound by the Indian states of Maharashtra to the north, and Karnataka to the ...
along the west of
India India, officially the Republic of India, is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, seventh-largest country by area; the List of countries by population (United Nations), most populous country since ...
, and along Southeast
Asia Asia ( , ) is the largest continent in the world by both land area and population. It covers an area of more than 44 million square kilometres, about 30% of Earth's total land area and 8% of Earth's total surface area. The continent, which ...
up to
Indonesia Indonesia, officially the Republic of Indonesia, is a country in Southeast Asia and Oceania, between the Indian Ocean, Indian and Pacific Ocean, Pacific oceans. Comprising over List of islands of Indonesia, 17,000 islands, including Sumatra, ...
,
Singapore Singapore, officially the Republic of Singapore, is an island country and city-state in Southeast Asia. The country's territory comprises one main island, 63 satellite islands and islets, and one outlying islet. It is about one degree ...
,
Macau Macau or Macao is a special administrative regions of China, special administrative region of the People's Republic of China (PRC). With a population of about people and a land area of , it is the most List of countries and dependencies by p ...
,
Hong Kong Hong Kong)., Legally Hong Kong, China in international treaties and organizations. is a special administrative region of China. With 7.5 million residents in a territory, Hong Kong is the fourth most densely populated region in the wor ...
, the
Philippines The Philippines, officially the Republic of the Philippines, is an Archipelagic state, archipelagic country in Southeast Asia. Located in the western Pacific Ocean, it consists of List of islands of the Philippines, 7,641 islands, with a tot ...
,
Malaysia Malaysia is a country in Southeast Asia. Featuring the Tanjung Piai, southernmost point of continental Eurasia, it is a federation, federal constitutional monarchy consisting of States and federal territories of Malaysia, 13 states and thre ...
,
Mauritius Mauritius, officially the Republic of Mauritius, is an island country in the Indian Ocean, about off the southeastern coast of East Africa, east of Madagascar. It includes the main island (also called Mauritius), as well as Rodrigues, Ag ...
, Réunion,
Seychelles Seychelles (, ; ), officially the Republic of Seychelles (; Seychellois Creole: ), is an island country and archipelagic state consisting of 155 islands (as per the Constitution) in the Indian Ocean. Its capital and largest city, Victoria, ...
and
Oceania Oceania ( , ) is a region, geographical region including Australasia, Melanesia, Micronesia, and Polynesia. Outside of the English-speaking world, Oceania is generally considered a continent, while Mainland Australia is regarded as its co ...
. Many of those creoles are now extinct, but others still survive in the
Caribbean The Caribbean ( , ; ; ; ) is a region in the middle of the Americas centered around the Caribbean Sea in the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic Ocean, mostly overlapping with the West Indies. Bordered by North America to the north, Central America ...
, the north and east coasts of
South America South America is a continent entirely in the Western Hemisphere and mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, with a considerably smaller portion in the Northern Hemisphere. It can also be described as the southern Subregion#Americas, subregion o ...
(
The Guyanas The Guianas, also spelled Guyanas or Guayanas, are a geographical region in north-eastern South America. Strictly, the term refers to the three Guianas: Guyana, Suriname, and French Guiana, formerly British, Dutch, and French Guiana respectiv ...
), western
Africa Africa is the world's second-largest and second-most populous continent after Asia. At about 30.3 million km2 (11.7 million square miles) including adjacent islands, it covers 20% of Earth's land area and 6% of its total surfac ...
,
Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country comprising mainland Australia, the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania and list of islands of Australia, numerous smaller isl ...
(see
Australian Kriol language Australian Kriol, also known as Roper River Kriol, Fitzroy Valley Kriol, Australian Creole, Northern Australian Creole or Aboriginal English, is an English-based creole language that developed from a pidgin used initially in the region of Syd ...
), the
Philippines The Philippines, officially the Republic of the Philippines, is an Archipelagic state, archipelagic country in Southeast Asia. Located in the western Pacific Ocean, it consists of List of islands of the Philippines, 7,641 islands, with a tot ...
(see
Chavacano Chavacano or Chabacano () is a group of Spanish-based creole language varieties spoken in the Philippines. The variety spoken in Zamboanga City, located in the southern Philippine island group of Mindanao, has the highest concentration of spea ...
), island countries such as
Mauritius Mauritius, officially the Republic of Mauritius, is an island country in the Indian Ocean, about off the southeastern coast of East Africa, east of Madagascar. It includes the main island (also called Mauritius), as well as Rodrigues, Ag ...
and
Seychelles Seychelles (, ; ), officially the Republic of Seychelles (; Seychellois Creole: ), is an island country and archipelagic state consisting of 155 islands (as per the Constitution) in the Indian Ocean. Its capital and largest city, Victoria, ...
and in the
Indian Ocean The Indian Ocean is the third-largest of the world's five oceanic divisions, covering or approximately 20% of the water area of Earth#Surface, Earth's surface. It is bounded by Asia to the north, Africa to the west and Australia (continent), ...
.
Atlantic Creole Atlantic Creole is a cultural identifier of those with origins in the transatlantic settlement of the Americas via Europe and Africa.Amerindian languages The Indigenous languages of the Americas are the languages that were used by the Indigenous peoples of the Americas before the arrival of non-Indigenous peoples. Over a thousand of these languages are still used today, while many more are now e ...
.
Indian Ocean The Indian Ocean is the third-largest of the world's five oceanic divisions, covering or approximately 20% of the water area of Earth#Surface, Earth's surface. It is bounded by Asia to the north, Africa to the west and Australia (continent), ...
Creole languages are based on European languages with elements from Malagasy and possibly other Asian languages. There are, however, creoles like Nubi and Sango that are derived solely from non-European languages.


Social and political status

Because of the generally low status of the Creole peoples in the eyes of prior European colonial powers, creole languages have generally been regarded as "degenerate" languages, or at best as rudimentary "dialects" of the politically dominant parent languages. Because of this, the word "creole" was generally used by linguists in opposition to "language", rather than as a qualifier for it.See . Another factor that may have contributed to the relative neglect of creole languages in linguistics is that they do not fit the 19th-century
neogrammarian The Neogrammarians (, , ) were a German school of linguists, originally at the University of Leipzig, in the late 19th century who proposed the Neogrammarian hypothesis of the regularity of sound change. Overview According to the Neogrammarian ...
"tree model" for the evolution of languages, and its postulated regularity of sound changes (these critics including the earliest advocates of the
wave model In historical linguistics, the wave model or wave theory () is a model of language change in which a new language feature (innovation) or a new combination of language features spreads from its region of origin, being adopted by a gradually expa ...
, Johannes Schmidt and
Hugo Schuchardt Hugo Ernst Mario Schuchardt (; 4 February 1842, Gotha (Thuringia) – 21 April 1927, Graz (Styria)) was a German linguist, best known for his work in the Romance languages, the Basque language, and today especially as a pioneer in the study of mixe ...
, the forerunners of modern
sociolinguistics Sociolinguistics is the descriptive, scientific study of how language is shaped by, and used differently within, any given society. The field largely looks at how a language changes between distinct social groups, as well as how it varies unde ...
). This controversy of the late 19th century profoundly shaped modern approaches to the
comparative method In linguistics, the comparative method is a technique for studying the development of languages by performing a feature-by-feature comparison of two or more languages with common descent from a shared ancestor and then extrapolating backwards ...
in
historical linguistics Historical linguistics, also known as diachronic linguistics, is the scientific study of how languages change over time. It seeks to understand the nature and causes of linguistic change and to trace the evolution of languages. Historical li ...
and in creolistics. Because of social, political, and academic changes brought on by decolonization in the second half of the 20th century, creole languages have experienced revivals in the past few decades. They are increasingly being used in print and film, and in many cases, their community prestige has improved dramatically. In fact, some have been standardized, and are used in local schools and universities around the world. At the same time, linguists have begun to come to the realization that creole languages are in no way inferior to other languages. They now use the term "creole" or "creole language" for any language suspected to have undergone
creolization Creolization is the process through which creole languages and cultures emerge. Creolization was first used by linguists to explain how contact languages become creole languages, but now scholars in other social sciences use the term to describe ...
, terms that now imply no geographic restrictions nor ethnic prejudices. There is controversy about the extent to which creolization influenced the evolution of
African-American Vernacular English African-American Vernacular English (AAVE) is the variety of English natively spoken, particularly in urban communities, by most working- and middle-class African Americans and some Black Canadians. Having its own unique grammatical, voc ...
(AAVE). In the American education system, as well as in the past, the use of the word ''ebonics'' to refer to AAVE mirrors the historical negative connotation of the word ''creole''.


Classification


Historic classification

According to their external history, four types of creoles have been distinguished: plantation creoles, fort creoles,
maroon Maroon ( , ) is a brownish crimson color that takes its name from the French word , meaning chestnut. ''Marron'' is also one of the French translations for "brown". Terms describing interchangeable shades, with overlapping RGB ranges, inc ...
creoles, and creolized pidgins. By the very nature of a creole language, the
phylogenetic In biology, phylogenetics () is the study of the evolutionary history of life using observable characteristics of organisms (or genes), which is known as phylogenetic inference. It infers the relationship among organisms based on empirical dat ...
classification of a particular creole usually is a matter of dispute; especially when the pidgin precursor and its parent tongues (which may have been other creoles or pidgins) have disappeared before they could be documented. Phylogenetic classification traditionally relies on inheritance of the lexicon, especially of "core" terms, and of the grammar structure. However, in creoles, the core lexicon often has mixed origin, and the grammar is largely original. For these reasons, the issue of which language is ''the'' parent of a creole – that is, whether a language should be classified as a "French creole", "Portuguese creole" or "English creole", etc. – often has no definitive answer, and can become the topic of long-lasting controversies, where social prejudices and political considerations may interfere with scientific discussion.


Substrate and superstrate

The terms
substrate Substrate may refer to: Physical layers *Substrate (biology), the natural environment in which an organism lives, or the surface or medium on which an organism grows or is attached ** Substrate (aquatic environment), the earthy material that exi ...
and
superstrate In linguistics, a stratum (Latin for 'layer') or strate is a historical layer of language that influences or is influenced by another language through contact. The notion of "strata" was first developed by the Italian linguist Graziadio Isaia A ...
are often used when two languages interact. However, the meaning of these terms is reasonably well-defined only in
second language acquisition Second-language acquisition (SLA), sometimes called second-language learning—otherwise referred to as L2 (language 2) acquisition, is the process of learning a language other than one's native language (L1). SLA research examines how learners ...
or
language replacement Language shift, also known as language transfer, language replacement or language assimilation, is the process whereby a speech community shifts to a different language, usually over an extended period of time. Often, languages that are perceived ...
events, when the native speakers of a certain source language (the substrate) are somehow compelled to abandon it for another target language (the superstrate). The outcome of such an event is that erstwhile speakers of the substrate will use some version of the superstrate, at least in more formal contexts. The substrate may survive as a second language for informal conversation. As demonstrated by the fate of many replaced European languages (such as
Etruscan __NOTOC__ Etruscan may refer to: Ancient civilization *Etruscan civilization (1st millennium BC) and related things: **Etruscan language ** Etruscan architecture **Etruscan art **Etruscan cities **Etruscan coins **Etruscan history **Etruscan myt ...
,
Breton Breton most often refers to: *anything associated with Brittany, and generally **Breton people **Breton language, a Southwestern Brittonic Celtic language of the Indo-European language family, spoken in Brittany ** Breton (horse), a breed **Gale ...
, and Venetian), the influence of the substrate on the official speech is often limited to pronunciation and a modest number of loanwords. The substrate might even disappear altogether without leaving any trace. However, there is dispute over the extent to which the terms "substrate" and "superstrate" are applicable to the genesis or the description of creole languages. The language replacement model may not be appropriate in creole formation contexts, where the emerging language is derived from multiple languages without any one of them being imposed as a replacement for any other. The substratum–superstratum distinction becomes awkward when multiple superstrata must be assumed (such as in
Papiamento Papiamento () or Papiamentu (; ) is a Portuguese-based creole language spoken in the Dutch Caribbean. It is the most widely spoken language on Aruba, Bonaire, and Curaçao ( ABC Islands). The language, spelled in Aruba and in Bonaire and ...
), when the substratum cannot be identified, or when the presence or the survival of substratal evidence is inferred from mere typological analogies. On the other hand, the distinction may be meaningful when the contributions of each parent language to the resulting creole can be shown to be very unequal, in a scientifically meaningful way. In the literature on
Atlantic Creole Atlantic Creole is a cultural identifier of those with origins in the transatlantic settlement of the Americas via Europe and Africa.

Decreolization

Since creole languages rarely attain official status, the speakers of a fully formed creole may eventually feel compelled to conform their speech to one of the parent languages. This
decreolization Decreolization is a postulated phenomenon whereby over time a creole language reconverges with the lexifier from which it originally derived. The notion has attracted criticism from linguists who argue there is little theoretical or empirical b ...
process typically brings about a
post-creole speech continuum A post-creole continuum (or simply creole continuum) is a dialect continuum of varieties of a creole language between those most and least similar to the superstrate language (that is, a closely related language whose speakers assert or asserted ...
characterized by large-scale variation and
hypercorrection In sociolinguistics, hypercorrection is the nonstandard use of language that results from the overapplication of a perceived rule of language-usage prescription. A speaker or writer who produces a hypercorrection generally believes through a ...
in the language. It is generally acknowledged that creoles have a simpler grammar and more internal variability than older, more established languages. However, these notions are occasionally challenged. (See also
language complexity Language complexity is a topic in linguistics which can be divided into several sub-topics such as phonological, morphological, syntactic, and semantic complexity. The subject also carries importance for language evolution. Language complexity ...
.) Phylogenetic or
typological A typology is a system of classification used to organize things according to similar or dissimilar characteristics. Groups of things within a typology are known as "types". Typologies are distinct from taxonomies in that they primarily address t ...
comparisons of creole languages have led to divergent conclusions. Similarities are usually higher among creoles derived from related languages, such as the languages of Europe, than among broader groups that include also creoles based on non-Indo-European languages (like Nubi or Sango). French-based creole languages in turn are more similar to each other (and to varieties of French) than to other European-based creoles. It was observed, in particular, that definite articles are mostly prenominal in English-based creole languages and English whereas they are generally postnominal in French creoles and in the Quebec French, variety of French that was History of Quebec French, exported to what is now Quebec in the 17th and 18th century. Moreover, the European languages which gave rise to the creole languages of European colonies all belong to the same subgroup of Western Indo-European languages, Indo-European and have highly convergent grammars; to the point that Sapir Whorf, Whorf joined them into a single Standard Average European language group. French and English are particularly close, since English, through extensive borrowing, is typologically closer to French than to other Germanic languages. Thus the claimed similarities between creoles may be mere consequences of similar parentage, rather than characteristic features of all creoles.


Creole genesis

There are a variety of theories on the origin of creole languages, all of which attempt to explain the similarities among them. outline a fourfold classification of explanations regarding creole genesis: # Theories focusing on European input # Theories focusing on non-European input # Gradualist and developmental hypotheses # Universalist approaches In addition to the precise mechanism of creole genesis, a more general debate has developed whether creole languages are characterized by different mechanisms than traditional languages (which is McWhorter's 2018 main point) or whether in that regard creole languages develop by the same mechanisms as any other languages (e.g. DeGraff 2001).


Theories focusing on European input


Monogenetic theory of pidgins and creoles

The monogenetic theory of pidgins and creoles hypothesizes that all Atlantic creoles derived from a single Mediterranean Lingua Franca, via a West African Pidgin Portuguese of the seventeenth century, relexification, relexified in the so-called "slave Factory (trading post), factories" of Western Africa that were the source of the
Atlantic slave trade The Atlantic slave trade or transatlantic slave trade involved the transportation by slave traders of Slavery in Africa, enslaved African people to the Americas. European slave ships regularly used the triangular trade route and its Middle Pass ...
. This theory was originally formulated by
Hugo Schuchardt Hugo Ernst Mario Schuchardt (; 4 February 1842, Gotha (Thuringia) – 21 April 1927, Graz (Styria)) was a German linguist, best known for his work in the Romance languages, the Basque language, and today especially as a pioneer in the study of mixe ...
in the late nineteenth century and popularized in the late 1950s and early 1960s by Taylor, Whinnom, Thompson, and Stewart. However, this hypothesis is now not widely accepted, since it relies on all creole-speaking slave populations being based on the same Portuguese-based creole, despite no to very little historical exposure to Portuguese for many of these populations, no strong direct evidence for this claim, and with Portuguese leaving almost no trace on the lexicon of most of them, with the similarities in grammar explainable by analogous processes of loss of inflection and grammatical forms not common to European and West African languages. For example, points out that relexification postulates too many improbabilities and that it is unlikely that a language "could be disseminated round the entire tropical zone, to peoples of widely differing language background, and still preserve a virtually complete identity in its grammatical structure wherever it took root, despite considerable changes in its phonology and virtually complete changes in its lexicon".


Domestic origin hypothesis

Proposed by for the origin of English-based creoles of the West Indies, the domestic origin hypothesis argues that, towards the end of the 16th century, English-speaking traders began to settle in the Gambia and Sierra Leone rivers as well as in neighboring areas such as the Bullom and Sherbro coasts. These settlers intermarried with the local population leading to mixed populations, and, as a result of this intermarriage, an English pidgin was created. This pidgin was learned by slaves in slave depots, who later on took it to the West Indies and formed one component of the emerging English creoles.


European dialect origin hypothesis

The French-based creole languages, French creoles are the foremost candidates to being the outcome of "normal" language change, linguistic change and their creoleness to be sociohistoric in nature and relative to their colonial origin. Within this theoretical framework, a French-based creole languages, French creole is a language phylogenetically based on French language, French, more specifically on a 17th-century Koiné language, koiné French extant in Paris, the French Atlantic harbors, and the nascent French colonies. Supporters of this hypothesis suggest that the non-Creole French dialects still spoken in many parts of the Americas share mutual descent from this single koiné. These dialects are found in Canada (mostly in Québec and in Acadian communities), Louisiana, Saint-Barthélemy and as Language isolate, isolates in other parts of the Americas. Approaches under this hypothesis are compatible with gradualism in Language change, change and models of #Imperfect L2 learning, imperfect language transmission in koiné genesis.


Foreigner talk and baby talk

The Foreigner Talk (FT) hypothesis argues that a pidgin or creole language forms when native speakers attempt to simplify their language in order to address speakers who do not know their language at all. Because of the similarities found in this type of speech and speech directed to a small child, it is also sometimes called baby talk. suggest that four different processes are involved in creating Foreigner Talk: * Accommodation * Imitation * Telegraphic condensation * Conventions This could explain why creole languages have much in common, while avoiding a monogenetic model. However, , in analyzing German Foreigner Talk, claims that it is too inconsistent and unpredictable to provide any model for language learning. While the simplification of input was supposed to account for creoles' simple grammar, commentators have raised a number of criticisms of this explanation: # There are a great many grammatical similarities amongst pidgins and creoles despite having very different lexifier languages. # Grammatical simplification can be explained by other processes, i.e. the innate grammar of Derek Bickerton, Bickerton's language bioprogram theory. # Speakers of a creole's lexifier language often fail to understand, without learning the language, the grammar of a pidgin or creole. # Pidgins are more often used amongst speakers of different substrate languages than between such speakers and those of the lexifier language. Another problem with the FT explanation is its potential circularity. points out that FT is often based on the imitation of the incorrect speech of the non-natives, that is the pidgin. Therefore, one may be mistaken in assuming that the former gave rise to the latter.


Imperfect L2 learning

The imperfect L2 (second language) learning hypothesis claims that pidgins are primarily the result of the imperfect L2 learning of the dominant lexifier language by the slaves. Research on naturalistic L2 processes has revealed a number of features of "interlanguage systems" that are also seen in pidgins and creoles: * invariant verb forms derived from the infinitive or the least marked finite verb form; * loss of determiners or use of demonstrative pronouns, adjectives or adverbs as determiners; * placement of a negative particle in preverbal position; * use of adverbs to express modality (natural language), modality; * fixed single word order with no inversion in questions; * reduced or absent nominal plural marking. Imperfect L2 learning is compatible with other approaches, notably the European dialect origin hypothesis and the universalist models of language transmission.


Theories focusing on non-European input

Theories focusing on the substrate, or non-European, languages attribute similarities amongst creoles to the similarities of African substrate languages. These features are often assumed to be transferred from the substrate language to the creole or to be preserved invariant from the substrate language in the creole through a process of relexification: the substrate language replaces the native lexical items with lexical material from the superstrate language while retaining the native grammatical categories. The problem with this explanation is that the postulated substrate languages differ amongst themselves and with creoles in meaningful ways. argues that the number and diversity of African languages and the paucity of a historical record on creole genesis makes determining lexical correspondences a matter of chance. coined the term "cafeteria principle" to refer to the practice of arbitrarily attributing features of creoles to the influence of substrate African languages or assorted substandard dialects of European languages. For a representative debate on this issue, see the contributions to ; for a more recent view, . Because of the sociohistoric similarities amongst many (but by no means all) of the creoles, the
Atlantic slave trade The Atlantic slave trade or transatlantic slave trade involved the transportation by slave traders of Slavery in Africa, enslaved African people to the Americas. European slave ships regularly used the triangular trade route and its Middle Pass ...
and the plantation system of the European colonies have been emphasized as factors by linguists such as .


Gradualist and developmental hypotheses

One class of creoles might start as
pidgin A pidgin , or pidgin language, is a grammatically simplified form of contact language that develops between two or more groups of people that do not have a language in common: typically, its vocabulary and grammar are limited and often drawn f ...
s, rudimentary second languages improvised for use between speakers of two or more non-intelligible native languages. Keith Whinnom (in ) suggests that pidgins need three languages to form, with one (the superstrate) being clearly dominant over the others. The lexicon of a pidgin is usually small and drawn from the vocabularies of its speakers, in varying proportions. Morphological details like word inflections, which usually take years to learn, are omitted; the syntax is kept very simple, usually based on strict word order. In this initial stage, all aspects of the speech – syntax, lexicon, and pronunciation – tend to be quite variable, especially with regard to the speaker's background. If a pidgin manages to be learned by the children of a community as a native language, it may become fixed and acquire a more complex grammar, with fixed phonology, syntax, morphology, and syntactic embedding. Pidgins can become full languages in only a single generation. "Creolization" is this second stage where the pidgin language develops into a fully developed native language. The vocabulary, too, will develop to contain more and more items according to a rationale of lexical enrichment.


Universalist approaches

linguistic universal, Universalist models stress the intervention of specific general processes during the transmission of language from generation to generation and from speaker to speaker. The process invoked varies: a general tendency towards
semantic Semantics is the study of linguistic Meaning (philosophy), meaning. It examines what meaning is, how words get their meaning, and how the meaning of a complex expression depends on its parts. Part of this process involves the distinction betwee ...
transparency (linguistic), transparency, first-language learning driven by universal process, or a general process of discourse organization. Derek Bickerton, Bickerton's language bioprogram theory, proposed in the 1980s, remains the main universalist theory. Bickerton claims that creoles are inventions of the children growing up on newly founded plantations. Around them, they only heard pidgins spoken, without enough structure to function as natural languages; and the children used their own innate linguistic capacities to transform the pidgin input into a full-fledged language. The alleged common features of all creoles would then stem from those innate abilities being universal.


Recent studies

The last decades have seen the emergence of some new questions about the nature of creoles: in particular, the question of how complex creoles are and the question of whether creoles are indeed "exceptional" languages.


Creole prototype

Some features that distinguish creole languages from noncreoles have been proposed (by Bickerton, for example). John McWhorter has proposed the following list of features as defining the creole prototype, that is, any language born recently of a pidgin: * a lack of contextual inflection, that is, a lack of inflection that marks only agreement in case or gender (as opposed to inherent inflection that marks tense, mood or number); * a lack of functional tone marking, that is, a lack of tone that serves to distinguish lexical items (e.g. Mandarin Chinese vs. ) or to encode grammatical features; and * a lack of semantically opaque word formation, that is, a lack of words like "understand" or "make up", the meaning of which is not analyzable in terms of the meanings of their components. McWhorter argues that the absence of these three features is predictable in languages that were born recently of a pidgin, since learning them would constitute a distinct challenge to the non-native speaker. Over the course of generations, however, such features would be expected to gradually (re-)appear, and therefore "many creoles would harbor departures from the Prototype identifiable as having happened after the creole was born" (McWhorter 2018). As one example, McWhorter (2013) notes that the creole Sranan Tongo, Sranan, which has existed for centuries in a diglossia, diglossic relationship with Dutch, has borrowed some Dutch verbs containing the prefix ( in Sranan) and whose meaning is not analyzable; for instance the pair , . McWhorter claims that these three properties characterize any language that was born recently as a pidgin, and states "At this writing, in twenty years I have encountered not a single counterexample" (McWhorter 2018). Nevertheless, the existence of a creole prototype has been disputed by others: * Henri Wittmann (1999) and David argue that languages such as Manding languages, Manding, Soninke language, Soninke, Magoua dialect, Magoua French and Riau Indonesian have all these three features but show none of the sociohistoric traits of creole languages. McWhorter (2011, 2018) disagrees: for instance, he points out that Soninke has "a goodly amount" of inherent (i.e. non-contextual) inflection, that Magoua "retains ample marking of gender, person and number distinctions on verbs as well as conjugational classes" and therefore that these languages should not be considered creoles. * Others (see overview in ) have claimed the existence of creoles that serve as counterexamples to McWhorter's hypothesis – the existence of inflectional morphology in Berbice Dutch Creole, for example, or Tone (linguistics), tone in Papiamentu. Again, McWhorter (2018) disagrees. For instance, he points out that the use of tone in Papiamentu to distinguish participial verb forms from base ones appeared only after extensive contact with native Spanish speakers.


Exceptionalism

Building up on this discussion, McWhorter proposed that "the world's simplest grammars are Creole grammars", claiming that every noncreole language's grammar is at least as complex as any creole language's grammar. Gil has replied that Riau Indonesian has a simpler grammar than Saramaccan, the language McWhorter uses as a showcase for his theory. The same objections were raised by Wittmann in his 1999 debate with McWhorter. The lack of progress made in defining creoles in terms of their morphology and syntax has led scholars such as Robert Chaudenson,
Salikoko Mufwene Salikoko S. Mufwene is a linguist born in Mbaya-Lareme in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. He is the Edward Carson Waller Distinguished Service Professor at the University of Chicago, where he holds appointments in the Department of Linguisti ...
, Michel DeGraff, and Henri Wittmann to question the value of ''creole'' as a typological class; they argue that creoles are structurally no different from any other language, and that ''creole'' is a sociohistoric concept – not a linguistic one – encompassing displaced populations and slavery. spell out the idea of creole exceptionalism, claiming that creole languages are an instance of nongenetic language change due to language shift with abnormal transmission. Gradualists question the abnormal transmission of languages in a creole setting and argue that the processes which created today's creole languages are no different from universal patterns of language change. Given these objections to ''creole'' as a concept, DeGraff and others question the idea that creoles are exceptional in any meaningful way. Additionally, argues that some Romance languages are potential creoles but that they are not considered as such by linguists because of a historical bias against such a view.


Controversy

Creolistics investigates the relative creoleness of languages suspected to be creoles, what calls "the cline (linguistics), cline of creoleness". No consensus exists among creolists as to whether the nature of creoleness is prototypical or merely evidence indicative of a set of recognizable phenomena seen in association with little inherent unity and no underlying single cause.


"Creole", a sociohistoric concept

''Creoleness'' is at the heart of the controversy with John McWhorter and Mikael Parkvall opposing Henri Wittmann (1999) and Michel DeGraff. In McWhorter's definition, creoleness is a matter of degree, in that prototypical creoles exhibit all of the three traits he proposes to diagnose creoleness: little or no inflection, little or no Tone (linguistics), tone, and Transparency (linguistic), transparent derivation (linguistics), derivation. In McWhorter's view, less prototypical creoles depart somewhat from this prototype. Along these lines, McWhorter defines Haitian Creole, exhibiting all three traits, as "the most creole of creoles". A creole like Palenquero, on the other hand, would be less prototypical, given the presence of inflection to mark plural, past, gerund, and participle forms. Objections to the McWhorter-Parkvall hypotheses point out that these typological parameters of creoleness can be found in languages such as Manding languages, Manding, Soninke language, Sooninke, and Magoua dialect, Magoua French which are not considered creoles. Wittmann and DeGraff come to the conclusion that efforts to conceive a yardstick for measuring creoleness in any scientifically meaningful way have failed so far. comes to the same conclusion for Riau Indonesian. have adduced evidence as to creole languages which respond unexpectedly to one of McWhorter's three features (for example, inflectional morphology in Berbice Creole Dutch, Tone (linguistics), tone in Papiamentu). and have argued further that Creole languages are structurally no different from any other language, and that Creole is in fact a sociohistoric concept (and not a linguistic one), encompassing displaced population and slavery. discuss creolistics in relation to colonialism, colonialist ideologies, rejecting the notion that Creoles can be responsibly defined in terms of specific grammatical characteristics. They discuss the history of linguistics and nineteenth-century work that argues for the consideration of the sociohistorical contexts in which Creole languages emerged.


"Creole", a genuine linguistic concept

On the other hand, McWhorter points out that in languages such as Bambara language, Bambara, essentially a dialect of Manding languages, Manding, there is ample non-transparent derivation, and that there is no reason to suppose that this would be absent in close relatives such as Mandinka language, Mandinka itself. Moreover, he also observes that Soninke language, Soninke has what all linguists would analyze as inflections, and that current lexicography of Soninke is too elementary for it to be stated with authority that it does not have non-transparent derivation. Meanwhile, Magoua dialect, Magoua French, as described by Henri Wittmann, retains some indication of grammatical gender, which qualifies as inflection, and it also retains non-transparent derivation. and as interpreted by . Michel DeGraff's argument has been that Haitian Creole retains non-transparent derivation from French.


Additional resources

critically assesses the proposal that creole languages exist as a homogeneous structural type with shared and/ or peculiar origins. groups creole genesis theories into four categories: * Theories focusing on the European input * Theories focusing on the non-European input * Gradualist and Developmental linguistics, developmental hypotheses * Universalist approaches The authors also confine Pidgins and mixed languages into separate chapters outside this scheme whether or not relexification come into the picture.


Further reading

*


See also

* Criollo people * Diglossia * Language contact * Lingua franca * List of creole languages * Macaronic language * Nation language * Nicaraguan Sign Language


Creoles by parent language

* Arabic-based creole languages * Assamese language, Assamese-based: Nagamese Creole, Nagamese * Bengali language, Bengali-Meitei language, Meitei creole: Bishnupriya Manipuri language, Bishnupriya Manipuri * Chinese-based creole languages * Dutch-based creole languages * English-based creole languages * French-based creole languages * German-based creole languages * Hindi-based: Andaman Creole Hindi * Japanese-based creole languages * Kongo language, Kongo-based: Kituba language, Kituba * Malay-based creole languages * Ngbandi language, Ngbandi-based: Sango * Portuguese-based creole languages * Spanish-based creole languages * Sinhala language, Sinhala-based: Vedda language, Vedda * Swahili language, Swahili-based: Kutchi-Swahili


References


Bibliography

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Further reading

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * Wittmann, Henri (1999)
"Prototype as a typological yardstick to creoleness."
''The Creolist Archives Papers On-Line'', Stockholms Universitet. * Wittmann, Henri (2001)

CreoList debate, parts I-VI, appendixes 1–9. ''The Linguist List'', Eastern Michigan University, Wayne State University


External links


International Magazine Kreol

Association of Portuguese and Spanish Lexically-based Creoles


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at the Online Dictionary of Language Terminology (ODLT)
Louisiana Creole Dictionary

Society for Pidgin & Creole Linguistics

Atlas of Pidgin and Creole Language Structures (APiCS)


In French


Groupe Européen de Recherches en Langues Créoles
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Associação Brasileira de Estudos Crioulos e Similares

Society for Caribbean Linguistics
{{Authority control Pidgins and creoles, Linguistics terminology