Creole Institute busy in wake of Carribbean quake

When students walk into the IU Creole Institute, the first thing they might notice is the books —  the bookshelves full of books, dictionaries and textbooks.

“Everything about Haitian culture is in some part represented here,” said Haitian researcher Solfils Telfort, who works at the institute. 

Since the earthquake in Haiti on Jan. 12, the Creole Institute, a research and training facility that specializes in the applied linguistics of French-based creoles including the Creole spoken in Haiti, has seen an increase in its demand for books, dictionaries and translation help.

“Our function is to produce reference materials for a language that is needed,” said director and founder of the institute Albert Valdman. “We’ve done a lot with preserving the language, we’ve been helping people document this language.”

French-based Creole is a language that has arisen as a result of different versions of French. In the 17th century, when slaves were exposed to French, they learned an approximate version of French.

“The slaves didn’t have teachers, they taught themselves,” Valdman said. “It’s neither African nor French.”

According to the Huffington Post in February of this year, 44 organizations had been set up to help in Haiti. Relief workers and volunteers in some of these organizations would have needed to learn Creole.

The institute said since the earthquake, there has been a great demand for the language. 

“There will be a need for people to have the language,” Valdman said. “We’ve had a lot of requests recently for groups going to Haiti.”

Jan. 12, the same day as the earthquake, was the U.S. Department of Education’s deadline for a list of critical languages, and Creole was not considered one of them. Because the list was published on the date of the earthquake, the list does not take into account how many people will travel to Haiti that want and need to learn Creole.

Because Creole is not recognized by the Department of Education as a critical language, the Creole Institute might not receive as much funding from outside sources as it usually does.

“The University has been very generous in providing for the language even though we don’t have that many students,” Valdman said. “Now if we don’t have funding from the outside, there is not much we can do.”