Creole: A generic term

A. Creoles are spoken throughout the world, wherever history has forced people to expand a pidgin into a full language. For example, in Louisiana, African slaves developed a creole based on French, just as South Seas natives developed one based on English. Louisiana blacks call this language Creole, but this is actually just one of dozens of creole languages. Creolization is a general process in language change.

B. Caribbean creoles. For example, Louisiana Creole was but one of many creoles developed by African slaves brought to work plantations in the New World. Jamaican patois was one; Haitian Creole is another; Papiamentu of Curaçao is a creole based on Spanish. Most of the world’s creoles were born in plantation or similar conditions.

C. Creoles elsewhere. Creoles are also spoken on the West African coast, such as the ones created as the Portuguese explored and colonized there, starting in the 1400s. Cape Verdean is one of these. The Portuguese also left behind several creoles in India and Southeast Asia. Mauritian Creole is a French creole spoken on an island near Madagascar.

D. Folk terminology and “pidgin.” Some creoles are called “pidgin” by their speakers. Jamaican patois was transported to the West African coast in the 1800s and gave birth to several new creoles in Sierra Leone, Nigeria, and Cameroon. These are often called “pidgin,” though they are actually real languages: creoles. An English creole was also born in Hawaii but is still called “pidgin” there.