Nouvèl: Kreyòl Education
Kreyòl is the most widely spoken language in Haiti today. Approximately 95 percent (around 10 million) of the population speaks only Kreyòl. The other five percent fluently speak French, as well as Kreyòl. Although French is the minority language of Haiti, it is still the principal language of instruction. Exams, standardized tests, and STEM education all utilize French. An initiative to teach children Kreyòl language and use it in STEM education is becoming a realization for The Republic of Haiti today. The MIT- Haiti Initiative is bringing forth tools and education using Kreyòl for children.
The Initiative offers various tools and resources in Kreyòl for students to utilize in order to help progress their education in their native language. They offer algebra and geometry, as well as research-based interactive simulations in the sciences and mathematics. The Initiative also has a program called Star; a tool that enables students to study genetics and biochemistry and apply research methods in a classroom.
Kreyòl emerged between the 16th and 17th centuries, when colonizers of France and Spain grew and produced tobacco, cotton, and sugar cane on the island (then Hispaniola). When the demand for sugar cane rose, so too did the need for labor. This led to an increase in slave importation, which created a shift in interaction between the French and slaves. Slaves that couldn’t communicate with other slaves attempted to learn French, and the cycle of events merged French with African languages like Wolof, Fon, and Ewe. “Of all the French creoles of the Western Hemisphere, Haitian is probably the one that bears the most influence from African languages.” Haitian Creole and French share pronunciation and various other linguistic similarities. Unlike French, Kreyòl does not inflect verbs for person or tense and it does not have grammatical gender. Many words have undergone changes in both written and spoken language from most of the borrowed lexicon. For example, la lune (‘the moon’ in French) has changed to lalin, and les ouiseaux (the birds) is zwazo (bird).
In more recent times, the uses of French and Kreyòl in Haiti are clearly separated. Kreyòl became an official language of Haiti in 1987, almost 200 years after Haiti gained independence and concluded the Haitian Revolution. Though they are both official languages, French is considered the “high language”, with the social elites of Haiti that are able to speak it a much smaller minority. Until the last 20 years, formal education and broadcast media were provided only in French which was not understood by the majority of Haitians. Historically, this language barrier has been used to uphold the status of aforementioned elites. French is used in public and formal settings, while Kreyòl is used at home and in everyday conversation. Nineteen years ago the first collection of poetry in Keryòl and English, Open Gate: An Anthology of Haitian Creole Poetry, was published. Three years after that, Le Matin, a daily Haitian newspaper, published a complete Kreyòl edition as a nod to “National Creole Day”, on October 28. Examples like that are why this push for the change to Kreyòl education is paramount. More exposure gets the proverbial ball rolling. Michel DeGraff, a Linguistics Professor at MIT and Principal Investigator for the Haiti Initiative, believes this is the major key to academic success:
Research has shown that we learn best in the languages we speak most fluently. In Haiti at least 95 percent of the population is fluent in Kreyòl only. The use of any other language of instruction is a recipe for academic failure. This failure becomes a national tragedy when it repeats itself generation after generation, with Kreyòl-speaking children being taught in French
The discrepancies between which orthography - French or Haitian - has arisen in an effort to push for a Kreyòl based education system. In June of 2017 The Akademi Kreyòl Ayisyen (AKA) brought forth a modified orthography for Haitian Creole. The first Kreyòl orthography was adopted in 1979. After the initial several others were used, but presently the majority still use the 1979 orthography. With the efforts of organizations like the MIT initiative and AKA bringing Kreyòl into schools and more positive light all around, students in Haiti will have a greater opportunity to learn through their mother tongue.
