3 Caribbean native languages borne out of Africa

Antillean Creole

Antillean Creole is a French-based creole primarily spoken in the Lesser Antilles, specifically, the countries of Dominica, Grenada, Guadeloupe, Îles des Saintes, Martinique, Saint-Barthélemy (St. Barts), Saint Lucia, French Guiana, Trinidad and Tobago and Venezuela (mainly in Macuro, Güiria and El Callao Municipality). Dominican, Grenadian, St. Lucian, Trinidadian, Brazilian (Lanc-Patuá) and Venezuelan speakers of Antillean Creole call the language patois.

It is also spoken in various creole-speaking immigrant communities in the United States Virgin Islands, British Virgin Islands, and the island of Saint Martin. Its grammar and vocabulary include elements of Carib and African languages. Antillean Creole has approximately 1 million speakers. It allows migrants travelling between neighboring English and French-speaking territories in the Caribbean to communicate.

Because the Antillian creole has roots in many different countries stemming from different African mother languages, there is little information on specific words and their root origins. But as Professor Maureen Warner-Lewis nicely describes in her lecture, “African Heritage in the Caribbean”, there are many ways to see African influence in the languages.

The Caribbean use of “Allyuh” and “you all” also bear traits of West African language. Standard English just has “you,” which acts as the 2nd person singular AND the 2nd person plural. African languages make a distinction between the plural ‘you’ and the singular ‘you’ so therefore the “all” is inserted “allyuh”, “you all” to mean more than one. The Bajan “wunna,” which means “you all” is a version of the Ibo pronoun “unna” which has a similar meaning. “Moomoo” a word meaning stupid, or dumb, and “booboo” meaning coal in the eyes are also African based words. “Anansi” likewise is a chief character of folk tales in the Gold Coast. “Jumbi” is a word from Angola meaning a ghost, an entity that returns from the dead. “Locho” is a Congo word meaning “cheap; mean; stingy” that has found its way to the Caribbean. “Tabanka” or its variant (without the nasal consonants “n or m”) “Tabaka,” is a Congo word meaning sold out or bought out completely. So from this we have the Caribbean word “tabanka/tabaka” meaning completely lost in love. “Tooloom” comes from the word “toolumuka” which means to drag oneself or to pull out teeth. The Caribbean word “Lahe” which mean “wutless” or “good for nothing” is based in the Congo word “laha” which means the same. “Kongori” can be found in a series of languages in Africa from Gabon to the interior, and the meaning is the same – a millipede. “Kaiso” among the Niger Delta peoples is a term that means “well done!” and so at the end of a “kaiso” or “calypso” it is very suitable to hear such an acclamation. “Dwen/Douen” is also an African word which refers to the soul of a child that has died.