Sunday, April 11, 2010
Patois
…what shall we say of a whole corner of the United States where not only a peculiar Romanic population live the most curious of lives, but where, along with this life and seemingly as one result of it, a whole series of interesting problems in linguistics is going on, the explanation of which throws much light on the processes that originate and modify dialects?
Louisiana was settled by the French under Bienville nearly two hundred years ago. A good many of the early settlers were Canadians, Acadians, refugees and immigrants from San Domingo and the West Indies, adventurers from thee provinces of southern and western France—a medley of Romance-speaking languages from every part of Mediterranean Europe, Spain, Portugal and the Biscay regions…early in the last century a tint from Africa…changes, gradual at first, have gone on perpetuating themselves down to the present day,until the parishes of Louisiana have a physiognomy as distinct as the isle of Greece.
-The Creole Patois of Louisiana, by J. A. Harrison, 1882
Louisiana was settled by the French under Bienville nearly two hundred years ago. A good many of the early settlers were Canadians, Acadians, refugees and immigrants from San Domingo and the West Indies, adventurers from thee provinces of southern and western France—a medley of Romance-speaking languages from every part of Mediterranean Europe, Spain, Portugal and the Biscay regions…early in the last century a tint from Africa…changes, gradual at first, have gone on perpetuating themselves down to the present day,until the parishes of Louisiana have a physiognomy as distinct as the isle of Greece.
-The Creole Patois of Louisiana, by J. A. Harrison, 1882
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