Louisiana Creole

Louisiana Creole
kréyol
Native to	Louisiana, (particularly St. Martin Parish, , St. Landry Parish, Jefferson Parish, Lafayette Parish and Pointe Coupee Parish, Louisiana); also in California (chiefly Southern California), Illinois, and a small community in East Texas.
Native speakers	(70,000 cited 1985) ~10,000 cited 2013
Language family	French Creole Louisiana Creole
Language codes
ISO 639-3
Glottolog	loui1240
Linguasphere	51-AAC-ca
French spread in Louisiana. Parishes marked in yellow are those where 4–10% of the population speak French or Louisiana French at home, orange 10–15%, red 15–20%, brown 20–30%.

Louisiana Creole (kréyol la lwizyàn; French: créole louisianais) is a French-based creole language spoken by some of the Louisiana Creole people of the state of Louisiana. The language largely consists of elements of French, Native American, and African languages.

Louisiana Creole French (LCF) is a contact language that arose from interactions between speakers of French and various African languages in the 18th century. For this reason, prior to its establishment, the precursor to LCF was considered a pidgin language. In its historical backdrop, this pidgin was born to facilitate communication between African slaves and francophone land owners. Once the pidgin tongue was transmitted to the next generation (who were then considered the first native speakers of the new grammar), it could effectively be considered a creole language.

In the case of Louisiana Creole French (LCF), a diglossia resulted between LCF – a language spoken almost exclusively by African slaves and their descendants – and Plantation Society French (PSF) also known as Colonial French. The latter was frequently associated with plantation owners, plantation overseers, small landowners, military officers/soldiers and bilingual, free people of color. Over the centuries, LCF’s negative associations with slavery have stigmatized the language to the point where many speakers are reluctant to use it for fear of ridicule. In this way, the assignment of “high” variety (or H language) was allotted to PSF and that of “low” variety (or L language) was given to LCF (please refer to diglossia for more information on H and L languages).

As a result of Louisiana becoming one of the United States of America, matters only worsened for the social status of LCF. With the United States being one of the wealthiest countries in the world and English being one of the most globalized languages, the promise of upward mobility prompted many speakers of LCF to abandon their language. Additionally, the geographical position of Louisiana in unison with technological advances has made the entire region accessible to other areas. This not only exposes Louisiana Creole French to more linguistic competition, but also reinforces the divide between H and L languages since most people who enter the region are typically English speakers.