Digital platforms help spread and standardize Creole, language experts say

Kreyòl — the mixture of African, Taino and French-based languages that Haitians speak — first emerged on the sugarcane plantations of Saint-Domingue, now Haiti, during the late 17th century. From inception, the language faced suppression and marginalization, and didn’t become an official tongue of Haiti until 180 years later.

But now, thanks to new technologies and digital platforms integrating the long-ignored language into their software, some language experts and Creole advocates say, Creole is spreading like never before. If the trend holds, the next milestone for adoption and recognition globally may come much faster.

“The digital revolution has not only accelerated the level of accessibility and usage of the language developed and spoken by Haitians, but also connected it well to the global community,” Marleen Julien, founder and CEO of  Creole Solutions, told The Haitian Times.

In recent years, Creole has been incorporated into social media platforms such as Meta’s Facebook as a language option, search engines such as Google Translate and Microsoft Bing Translator, and in  app-based courses such as Rosetta Stone and Duolingo. Such integrations, the advocates say, have significantly contributed to amplifying the language’s value and cultural expression globally.

Also, Haitians today have unprecedented opportunities to promote their culture and preserve their heritage better than ever before with technology. The use of Creole has been at the center of this movement. 

In a recent presentation at LocWorld, a localization conference, Julien highlighted how her company’s collaboration with Meta Platforms has resulted in Creole being among the top 35 standard languages integrated into the global digital giant.

“It’s all about giving Creole the respect it deserves,” she said.

Respect and proper usage for Creole

To its strongest advocates, respect means properly using Creole — spoken by 12 million in Haiti and millions more abroad — in both oral and written forms. 

“Creole is one of the Caribbean’s most beautiful languages,” Rosetta Stone writes on its site, detailing how people can learn to speak the Haitian language.

Such views and positioning have helped push a standard Creole into the global community. Now, many people agree that Creole be incorporated in all major digital platforms, not just because it is the primary language of Haitians, but also because it connects the world to Haiti’s vibrant culture — a tapestry of traditions, unique art, music, cuisine and natural landscape filled with beauty.

Because of its heavy historical legacy and cultural relationship with the French language, Creole can be easily confused with French. But like any other language, unless you learn how to write Creole, you won’t do it correctly.

But new technologies have made even that aspect easier to learn and use.

“If it seems that you have recently encountered more well-crafted, grammatically correct Haitian Creole on online platforms, you are not mistaken,” Julien wrote in a recent opinion piece.

To consolidate the advancements and continued respect of standard Creole, “It’s a collective effort,” she said. “Everyone needs to be mindful of how the language rules when writing on the Internet. Despite the breakthroughs of artificial intelligence (AI), machines alone cannot produce wholly accurate translations. People must continue to feed AI engines with relevant information before these machines can begin learning from it.”

Marxi Julien, Creole Solutions’ chief technology officer, has been overseeing the simultaneous processing of translation projects at the company and designing customized Creole applications.

He argued that machines can only draw on data people put in. If people spell correctly most of the time, machine learning will reproduce just that. 

“Before an online tool such as Google Translate can produce basic phrases in Creole, translators must pour over long vocabulary lists to confirm equivalencies,” Marleen Julien added. “Therefore, such tools struggle to translate complex texts with special professional terms or slang.”

More educational tools, institutional support needed

Despite being the native tongue of Haitians, French remained the sole official language of the country, used by a tiny elite and ‘educated’ few in formal institutions, legislation and education. The practice alienated the Creole-speaking majority, especially those in rural areas. 

Creole was elevated in status in 1979 when the Institut Pédagogique National established an official orthography for it. Years later, that orthography underwent slight modifications, notably the removal of the hyphen (-) and apostrophe (’) marks and the retention of the grave accents (è) and (ò), called aksan fòs. However, the core standards remain the same and have been bolstered by the Haitian Creole Academy’s (Akademi Kreyòl Ayisyen) establishment in 2014.

Creole finally became a second official language when Haiti adopted a new Constitution in 1987. Despite the mandate, it took nearly another three decades for the Haitian parliament to finally vote for a law establishing the Creole Academy to regulate and enforce the standardization of the Haitian language’s syntax and usage.

Still, some significant work needs to be done. For instance, in many schools in Haiti, teachers deliver instruction verbally in Creole while using materials written in French.

Haitian linguist and Creole translator Websder Corneille, an adjunct lecturer in Haitian Creole, culture, and society at Indiana University Bloomington, is also an English as Second Language (ESL) interventionist at Phalen Leadership Academies in Indianapolis for many Haitian students. He highlighted the importance of developing a standard Creole curriculum for teachers. 

“We need pedagogical and methodological tools to teach efficiently and effectively,” Corneille said during a conversation with  1804 Renaissance, a podcast dedicated to celebrating Haitian heritage.

Some experts said that Haitian Creole Academy scholars could develop those materials in collaboration with Haiti’s Ministry of Education and with the help of universities and other institutions.

“The expertise exists, and the language is fully standardized to apply to any science and intellectual field,” Julien added. “Everyone involved must do their part to build on the progress and continue the trend made possible by digital technology, increasing Creole literature and scientific production.”