Cited in the 1945 book "Gumbo Ya-Ya" (look at the bottom of the 2nd page here). So not only did we make them with rice but we made them with cow peas (black eyed peas) like àkàrà in Nigeria & acarajé in Brazil.
Louisiana Folktales is a compilation of stories in Louisiana Creole compiled in the 1890s. The stories of "Compair Lapin" (Kompèr in modern orthography) connect Louisiana Creoles to the rest of the African diaspora because we all have similar stories of this rabbit.
In the Louisiana Creole language rum is typically called "tafya" or "tafia"(same pronunciation, different spelling).
If you look the word Bamboula/Bambula you can see how Louisiana connects to both Puerto Rico and the Dominican Republic and it's because of Kongo people. These Kongo people in Louisiana were brought into a heavily Senegambian/Malian influenced colony.
Creole culture ❤️
Louisiana Creole & Antillean Creole are 2 different French-based Creole languages but 2 of our dialects share a word that differs from the general words for "thing". The Northshore dialect of Louisiana Creole & the Guadeloupean dialect of Antillean Creole use "biten" for "thing".
In the past we played our drums the way people in the lesser antilles play drums particularly Martinique & Guadeloupe. The drawing in the left is from New Orleans, Louisiana in the early 1800s, the pictures on the right is a modern day picture from Martinique.
This Louisiana Creole word bitin/biten is shared with Creole from Guadeloupe. They use it as a general term for "thing" but we commonly use it to refer to goods, possessions, furniture etc. We use zafè, kèkshoj, kèkshoz, shoz, shoj for a general "thing".
"Tafya toujou di lavérité"
"Tafia (rum) always tells the truth"
- A Louisiana Creole proverb taken from the 1885 book "Gombo Zhèbes" but put in modern orthography.
All of that was once the Louisiana Territory. Some parts of it became Spanish West Florida. Later on it was all divided up into the states we see today.
Although king cakes are a part of our Creole traditions you can find a merging of Louisiana Creole & Italian things in this region. Example: Randazzo's king cakes. On the box it says "Nonna Randazzo". Some Louisiana Creoles even have Italian ancestry.
A classic book in Louisiana Creole/Kouri-Vini. This is a great way to teach Louisiana Creole.
youtube.com/watch?v=n_9m...
Because there's been lots of Americanization going on in Louisiana Creole communities people use the languages (both Creole & French) less and less and lots of vocabulary gets lost.
In Louisiana Creole aka Kouri-Vini it's a slang term for genitalia. This picture is a screencap from the Dictionary of Louisiana Creole.
Because these languages are from French colonies there was at times movement of people from colony to colony which created connections of dialect to a whole separate language while the other dialects lacked that connection.
#creole
#linguistics
#kreyol
#kréyol
What's interesting is sometimes a dialect of 1 language will have interesting similarities to another language because they may be related which is the case of Northern Haitian Creole & Antillean Creole. Northshore Louisiana Creole & Pointe Coupée have similarities to Antillean & Haitian Creole.
There's often confusion on the difference between "language" and "dialect". A dialect is a variety of a language. French-based Creole languages are separate languages each with their own dialects & sub-dialects. Mutually intelligibility can vary from dialect to dialect & language to language.
Yes, it sure does!
The pic is from the book "African American Religious Cultures". The 2nd pic is from the PDF document "Historical Linguistic Dimensions of Spirit Migration in Haitian Vodou". The 3rd pic is from a screencap of the Wikipedia article about Candomblé Bantu.
A middle passage marker in Biloxi, Mississippi was unveiled. During the French period Biloxi was actually part of French Louisiana & was the 2nd capital. The 1st ship to arrive came out of Ouidah which is in what is today Benin.
This is a native speaker of Louisiana Creole named "Ben Guiné". "Guiné" is an old way of referring to West Africa particularly near the coast. African derived surnames are/were found among Louisiana Afro-Creoles like "Guiné", "Senegal", "Mina", "Poulard", "Nago", "Congo"etc.
This book is old so it uses the old orthography for these languages which essentially is a French-like orthography which isn't used today. Today phonetic or approximate orthographies are used for these Creole languages.
Gombo Zhebes! This is a fun little book for those interested in French based Creole languages. It has proverbs from Louisiana, Haiti, Mauritius, French Guiana, Martinique & Trinidad. The last 2 places speak 2 dialects of the same language which is Antillean Creole.
#creole
#gombosky
#kblfsky
For posts in French-based Creole languages we're going to use the hashtag #kblfsky
Nou va sèrvi hashtag-la #kblfsky pou post-yé en tou langaj kréyol baz lèksikal françé
On va utiliser le hashtag #kblfsky pour postes en langues créoles à base lexicale française.
Yes! Some people in Pointe Coupée parish speak that way. The Creole of Pointe Coupée is an interesting dialect of Louisiana Creole!
Saint Lucian Creole is beautiful! It's a dialect of Lesser Antillean Creole from the island of St. Lucia.
Louisiana is connected to other places more than just linguistically. In Louisiana Voodoo, Haitian Vodou & Brazilian Candomblé Bantu/Candomblé Angola they share a Kongo spirit named Limba/Lemba. Kongo people and their culture connects so many of us.
I think it'd be neat if we had a live chat or live video feature so we could all talk about how much we enjoy Bluesky becauseit seems like most of us are enjoying ourselves. Call it Sky live in Sky chat or something. Just a suggestion, not a criticism of this place.
The different uses of Creole throughout the world always causes problems. Where in from or means anybody born in the colony regardless of race.
It's no secret that Louisiana Creole culture is very much like that of the Caribbean.
"The Picayune’s Creole Cookbook’s Creole jambalaya is not far from one variation from Santiago de Cuba, a city in the country’s eastern section"
64parishes.org/caribbean-co...
I'd like to clear up a common misunderstanding. Louisiana Creole & Louisiana French are 2 separate languages & they're both spoken by Louisiana Creole people. LF is a local dialect of French, LC is a language & not a dialect of French. "Cajun French" is also a bad name for our dialect of French.
