This course is intended to function as a workshop for discussing a variety of phonological challenges encountered in the analysis of French-based creole languages (CBLF). The rationale for choosing this language family lies in its origin in the contact between French and certain languages spoken by African slaves. CBLFs exhibit the traces of this hybridity, displaying grammatical properties that are simultaneously characteristic of French and certain African languages (Lefebvre 1998).

The goal for linguists is to discern the linguistic properties of CBLFs that are characteristic of French from those linked to substrate languages (African languages). We will investigate the phonological descriptions of Guadeloupean, Haitian, Réunionnais, and St. Lucian creoles within the scope of a linguistic theory that seeks an explanatory analysis of observed data. In particular, we will tackle the following questions: 1) syllabic distribution of consonant and vowel sequences, 2) nasality and the principles regulating its propagation, 3) distribution of allomorphs of the determiner /la/, 4) reduction of consonant sequences in word-final position, 5) phonetic variations of the consonant R, its phonemic status, and its phonological representation.

Students from other graduate programs may submit assignments in English with approval of the instructor.