Seychellois Creole
| Seychellois Creole | |
|---|---|
| kreol, seselwa | |
| Native to | Seychelles |
| Ethnicity | Seychellois Creoles |
Native speakers | (73,000 cited 1998)[1] |
French Creole
| |
| Dialects | |
| Latin | |
| Official status | |
Official language in |  Seychelles |
| Regulated by | Lenstiti Kreol |
| Language codes | |
| ISO 639-3 | crs |
| Glottolog | sese1246 |
| Linguasphere | (& -ceb) 51-AAC-cea (& -ceb) |
 Location of Seychelles where the creole is spoken | |
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Seychellois Creole (/seɪˈʃɛlwɑː/), also known as Kreol, is the French-based creole language spoken by the Seychelles Creole people of the Seychelles. It shares national language status with English and French (in contrast to Mauritian and Réunion Creole, which lack official status in Mauritius and France).
History
[edit]The Seychelles were first settled in 1770, by French settler from the island of Mauritius. The islands population was mostly made up of slaves with a few whites and free blacks. Over time the Mauritian creole that was spoken by the slave population diverged enough from Mauritian Creole to be considered its own creole separate from Mauritian Creole. It further diverged after the freeing of Seychelles slaves in 1835 and the subsequent influx of Bantu peoples from East Africa to the islands.[2]
49 fables of La Fontaine were adapted to the dialect around 1900 by Rodolphine Young (1860–1932) but these remained unpublished until 1983.[3]
Status
[edit]The Seychelles gained independence in 1976 and since 1978 Seychellois Creole has been one of the country's three official languages. It is currently the native language of over 99% of the country's population.[2] Seychellois Creole is the primary language of music, literature, politics, public usage, and mass media in the Seychelles. Though Seychellois literature has been increasingly replaced by English literature.[4]
While Seychellois laws are written in English, the working language of the National Assembly is Creole and the verbatim record of its meetings provides an extensive corpus for its contemporary use in a formal setting.[5]
Dialects
[edit]They is some in Seychellois Creole in the Seychelles based on geography with limited differences in morphosyntax and lexicon but not enough to be considered separate dialects.[4] The only existing dialect of Seychellois Creole is Chagossian Creole spoken by Chagossians in the United Kingdom, Mauritius, and the Seychelles.[6]
Lexicon
[edit]Over 98% of the Seychellois Creole lexicon is derived either from Standard French or a dialect of French. Though a study in 1982 found 1026 words either borrowed from other languages or is of unknown origin. Borrowed words come from Bantu languages especially Swahili, Malagasy, and English.[7] In several Seychellois Creole words derived from French, the French definite article (le, la and les) has become part of the word; for example, 'future' is lavenir (French l'avenir). The possessive is the same as the pronoun, so that 'our future' is nou lavenir. Similarly in the plural, les Îles Éloignées Seychelles in French ('the Outer Seychelles Islands') has become Zil Elwanyen Sesel in Creole. Note the z in Zil, as, in French, les Îles is pronounced /le.z‿il/.
| Language | Word | ||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Creole | Nou | tou | bezwen | travay | ansanm | pou | kre | nou | lavenir | ||
| French (IPA) | /nu‿z/ | /a.vɔ̃/ | /tus/ | /bə.zwɛ̃/ | /də/ | /tʁa.va.je/ | /ɑ̃.sɑ̃bl/ | /puʁ/ | /kʁe.e/ | /nɔtʁ/ | /av.niʁ/ |
| French | Nous | avons | tous | besoin | de | travailler | ensemble | pour | créer | notre | avenir |
| Translation | We | all | need | to | work | together | to | create | our | future | |
| Gloss | We | have | all | need | to | work | together | for | create | our | future |
Samples
[edit]| Seychellois Creole | English |
|---|---|
|
Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name; |
Notes
[edit]- ^ Seychellois Creole at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015) (subscription required)
- ^ a b "APiCS Online - Survey chapter: Seychelles Creole". apics-online.info. Retrieved 2024-10-06.
- ^ Fables de La Fontaine traduites en créole seychellois, Hamburg, 1983; there is also a selection at Potomitan.info
- ^ a b Michaelis, Susanne Maria; Rosalie, Marcel (2013), "Seychelles Creole structure dataset", Atlas of Pidgin and Creole Language Structures Online, Leipzig: Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, retrieved 2024-10-08
- ^ National Assembly - Hansard - Verbatim
- ^ Arends, Jacques; Muysken, Pieter; Smither, Norval (1994). 26. An annotated list of creoles, pidgins and mixed languages. John Benjamins Publishing Company. p. 347.
- ^ "APiCS Online - Survey chapter: Seychelles Creole". apics-online.info. Retrieved 2024-10-06.
References
[edit]- Annegret Bollée. 1977a. Le créole français des Seychelles: Esquisse d’une grammaire, textes, vocabulaire. Tübingen: Niemeyer.
- D'Offay, Danielle & Lionnet, Guy, Diksyonner Kreol - Franse / Dictionnaire Créole Seychellois - Français. Helmut Buske Verlag, Hamburg. 1982. ISBN 3-87118-569-8.
External links
[edit]
- Seychelles Creole Vocabulary List (from the World Loanword Database)
- Seychelles Creole Magazine (Discover the Creole Culture)
- Liv Servis online triglot text in English, French and Seychellois Creole digitized by Richard Mammana
- Universal Declaration of Human Rights in Seychellois Creole
