The Capeverdean Crioulo is a dialect continuum spoken on the islands of Cape Verde, whose extremes lie at the islands of Santiago and that of Santo Antão. They are creole languages based on Portuguese and influenced by West African languages. Current distribution of Human Language Families Most languages are known to belong to language families. ... Portuguese creoles are creole languages which have been significantly influenced by Portuguese. ... ISO 639-1 is the first part of the ISO 639 international-standard language-code family. ... ISO 639-2:1998 Codes for the representation of names of languages — Part 2: Alpha-3 code Twenty-two of the languages have two three-letter codes: a code for bibliographic use (ISO 639-2/B) a code for terminological use (ISO 639-2/T). ... ISO 639-3 is in process of development as an international standard for language codes. ... The International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) is a system of phonetic notation devised by linguists to accurately and uniquely represent each of the wide variety of sounds (phones or phonemes) used in spoken human language. ... Phonetics (from the Greek word φωνή, phone = sound/voice) is the study of sounds (voice). ... Technical note: Due to technical limitations, some web browsers may not display some special characters in this article. ... A dialect continuum is a range of dialects spoken across a large geographical area, differing only slightly between areas that are geographically close, and gradually decreasing in mutual intelligibility as the distances become greater. ... Santiago (Portuguese meaning Saint James) is the largest island of Cape Verde, its most important agricultural centre and home to half the nations population. ... Santo Antão (Portuguese for Saint Anthony) is the westernmost and largest of the Barlavento islands of Cape Verde. ... A creole is a language descended from a pidgin that has become the native language of a group of people. ... Africa is the worlds second-largest and second most populous continent, after Asia. ...

Internal classification

Capeverdean Crioulos are usually classified into two branches:

• Sotavento (Kriolu): Santiago, Maio, Fogo, and Brava.
• Barlavento (Criol): São Vicente, São Nicolau, Sal, Boavista, and Santo Antão.

Origins

The roots of crioulo are Old Portuguese as superstrate and West African languages as substrate. The capeverdean creoles can be divided into two very distinctive groups: Sotavento Creoles and Barlavento Creoles. There exists numerous parallels between the capeverdean creoles and the West African languages (i.e.: lack of distinction of voice, verbal adjectives, adjectives following the noun, the use of intonation to differentiate between interrogative and declarative sentences, frequent repetition of words, presence of African morphological structures, etc.). The Bádiu is also very close to the creole of Guinea-Bissau (Upper Guinea Creole) from mainland Africa, with some intelligibility. The Sotavento archipelago (literally, the Leeward), is the southern island group of Cape Verde. ... Santiago Crioulo or Bádiu is the Capeverdean Crioulo (Krioulu) spoken on Santiago Island of Cape Verde. ... The Brava Crioulo (crioulo de Brava in Portuguese) is the variant of Capeverdean creole spoken in the Brava Island of Cape Verde. ... The Barlavento archipelago (literally, the Windward), is the northern island group of Cape Verde. ... The São Vicente Crioulo, locally criol de Soncente (crioulo de São Vicente in Portuguese), is the variant of Capeverdean creole spoken in the São Vicente Island of Cape Verde. ... The Santo Antão Crrioulo, locally criol de Santa Antão (crioulo de são vicente in Portuguese), is the variant of Capeverdean creole spoken in the São Vicente Island of Cape Verde. ...

The differences between the creole of Santiago and the creole of Santo Antão are as great as the differences between Portuguese and Spanish. As Portuguese and Spanish are considered as a language and not a dialect of Latin, the different capeverdean creoles can not be considered as dialects. As Portuguese is used in every day life (mainly in school and in relation with foreign countries) Portuguese and the Capeverdean Creoles live in a state of diglossia. Due to this overall presence of Portuguese, a decreolization process occurs for all the different capeverdean crioulo varieties or languages. In linguistics, diglossia is a situation where, in a given society, there are two (often) closely-related languages, one of high prestige, which is generally used by the government and in formal texts, and one of low prestige, which is usually the spoken vernacular tongue. ...

The Crioulo of Santiago, commonly known as Kriolu or Bádiu, is the creole of the main island of Cape Verde, and the creole of the capital of the country, Praia situated in the same island. We can also distinguish between urban and rural Santiago Crioulo, where the urban has modern influence of Portuguese. This crioulo variety is due to become official in late 2005. On July 7th, 2005, the Capeverdean president Pedro Pires declared in Mindelo: "... We are proclaiming that the time has come for Kriolu to take its place as the official language ..." Santiago Crioulo or Bádiu is the Capeverdean Crioulo (Krioulu) spoken on Santiago Island of Cape Verde. ... Aerial view of Praia Praia, population 61,644 (1990), is the capital of Cape Verde, an island nation in the Atlantic Ocean west of Senegal. ... July 7 is the 188th day of the year (189th in leap years) in the Gregorian Calendar, with 177 days remaining. ... Pedro Verona Rodrigues Pires (born April 29, 1934) is the socialist president of Cape Verde, since March 2001, succeeding António Mascarenhas Monteiro. ...

The Barlavento creoles are using i.e. the palato alveolar fricative sound. The crioulo of São Vicente or also the creole of the cultural capital of Cape Verde 'Mindelo' was promoted by the poems of Sergio Frusoni. The voiceless postalveolar fricative is a type of consonantal sound, used in some spoken languages. ... For other uses, see São Vicente (disambiguation) São Vicente (Crioulo: Sanvicente or Sanvcênt) is one of the Barlavento islands of the Cape Verde. ... Mindelo is a port town on the Cape Verde in the northern part of the island of São Vicente. ... Sergio Frusoni (August 10, 1901 in the island of São Vicente - May 29, 1975) was a Capeverdean poet. ...

The crioulo of Brava is known by the mornas of Eugénio Tavares, the crioulo of Santo Antão by the short-stories of Romano Luís de_Madeira Melo (Negrume/Lzimparin, 1973) and the crioulo of Fogo by the Capeverdean tales collected by Elsie Clews Parsons (Folklore from the Cape Verde Islands, 1923). Eugénio de Paula Tavares (11 May 1867 in the island of Brava and died the 6 January 1930) was a Cape Verdean poet. ... Luís Romano de Madeira Melo was born the 10th June in 1922 on the Capeverdean island of Santo Antão. ... 1973 (MCMLXXIII) was a common year starting on Monday. ... 1923 (MCMXXIII) was a common year starting on Monday (link will take you to calendar). ...

Vocabulary

Considering Santiago Crioulo (the only that has been sufficiently studied): more than 90% of the vocabulary is derived from Portuguese, the remaining is derived from West African languages. The significative erosion of most words and, especially, the very different grammar makes it extremely difficult for a Portuguese speaker even to establish a basic conversation.

Writing system

There is a new orthographic convention, named ALUPEC which stands for "Alfabeto Unificado para a Escrita do Caboverdiano" (Portuguese), "Alfabetu Unifikadu pa Skrita di Kabuverdianu" (Kriolu) which is written in Latin Alphabet. It has 23 letters and four digraphs: A B S D E F G H I J DJ L LH M N NH N O P K R T U V X TX Z. ALUPEC is based on efficiency and tries to simply the orthographic system. It has led to lot of scepticism and rejection on the other islands, mostly because it is based on the Santiago Crioulo. The rejection is due to the fact that it doesn't respect enough the over 100 year old writing history of the Capeverdean creole. ALUPEC accentuates for these reasons on the different capeverdean islands the fear of losing their own cultural identity. The Latin alphabet, also called the Roman alphabet, is the most widely used alphabetic writing system in the world today. ...

Citation from William A. Smalley: .... Writing Systems, after all, are cultural phenomena, used by people with feelings and emotions, with prejudices and fears ....

Today only Portuguese is used in school throughout Cape Verde. French is taught as the most popular learning language in school. Cape Verde is also one of the three lusophone members of the 'Organisation Internationale de la Francophonie'.

A small study (Student Survey 2000) in a secondary school in Barlavento islands showed little support for the use of creole in the classroom. This is however normal as the children of a secondary class are coming from different islands, each with its own creoles, often incomprehensible. The only solution out of this dilemma is the use of Portuguese in the classroom.

According to Manuel Veiga: ... there must be a process of standardization between the North and the North, which will take the variety of São Vicente as a basis, and another process South/South, which will take the variety of Santiago as a basis.... (see Language Policy in Cape Verde: A Proposal for the Affirmation of Kriolu )

Santiago Crioulo Sounds

Oral vowels

[a], [ɐ], [ɛ], [e], [i], [ɔ], [o], and [u]

Nasal vowels

[ɐ̃], [ẽ], [ĩ], [õ], and [ũ]

Semi-vowels

[j], and [w]

Affricate Consonants

[tʃ], [dʒ]

Simple Consonants

[b], [d], [f], [ɡ], [ʒ], [k], [l], [ʎ], [m], [n], [ɲ] , [ŋ] , [ p] , [ɾ] , [s] , [t] , [v], [ʃ], and [z]

Santiago Crioulo Grammar

verbs

In the grammar of the Creole of Santiago there are three categories of verbs: weak verbs (for most verbs), strong verbs and sér verb.

plural

Santiago Crioulo makes its plural by adding an "s", for that there are different rules:

• Adding just an 's' when ending in oral or nasal vowels:

báka → bákas (cow, cows from Portuguese vaca, vacas)

• Adding 'is' when the word is terminated in a consonant different than 's'

mudjér → mudjéris (woman, women from Portuguese mulher, mulheres)

• Adding 'sis' or 'zis' in lexicon ending with 's'

rapás → rapásis (boy, boys from Portuguese rapaz, rapazes)

olandés → olandezis (Dutch, Dutches from Portuguese Holandês, Holandeses)

The plural is only used in the first word of a phrase, and it can be a name, adjective, article, demonstrative, or numeral.

nóvi barakon (nine sheds) - The number nine already indicates "shed" is plural.

negation

In this situation we must distinguish three cases:

• negation

Nau! (no!, from Portuguese não!)

• negation of verbs

Pedro ka ta ben! (Peter doesn't come!, Portuguese O Pedro não vem!/ broken Portuguese: Pedro nunca? está vem)

• negation of attributes

tem kusa mas ka sábi (There are less pleasant things, Portuguese Há coisas pouco agradáveis/ broken Portuguese: Tem cousa mas nunca? saber)

The origin of "ka" is unknown. Some suggest it is from Portuguese "nunca" (never), while others refer it is of west African origin.

CapeVerdean Crioulos differences

Bibliography

For details see the following books:

• Os dialectos românicos ou neo-latinos na África, Ásia e América (F. Adolpho Coelho – 1880; capítulo 1: "Crioulo da Ilha de Santiago")

• O crioulo de Cabo Verde. Breves estudos sobre o crioulo das ilhas de Cabo Verde (Joaquim Vieira Botelho da Costa & Custódio José Duarte - 1886)

• Dialectos crioulos-portugueses. Apontamentos para a gramática do crioulo que se fala na ilha de Santiago de Cabo Verde (A. de Paula Brito - 1887)

• Folk-Lore from the Cape Verde Islands (Parsons, Elsie Clews - 1923: Capeverdian Stories; book 1: English, book 2: Creole of Fogo)

• O dialecto crioulo de Cabo Verde (Silva, Baltasar Lopes da - 1957)

• Cabo Verde. Contribuição para o estudo do dialecto falado no seu arquipélago (Dulce Almada Duarte - 1961)

• Renascença de uma civilização no Atlântico médio (Luís Romano de Madeira Melo, 1967: Collection of poems and stories in Portuguese and in the Creole of Santo Antão)

• O dialecto crioulo-Léxico do dialecto crioulo do Arquipélago de Cabo Verde (Fernandes, Armando Napoleão Rodrigues - 1969)

• Negrume/Lzimparin (Luís Romano de Madeira Melo - 1973: Stories in the Creole of Santo Antão with Portuguese translation)

• "Textos crioulos cabo-verdianos" in the creole of São Vicente– (Sérgio Frusoni in Miscelânea luso-africana - 1975 coord. Marius F. Valkhoff)

• Vangêle contód d'nôs móda (Sérgio Frusoni: Fogo - 1979; Novo Testamento – Creole of São Vicente)

• A linguistic approach to the Capeverdean language (Macedo, Donaldo Pereira - 1979)

• O crioulo de Cabo Verde - surto e expansão (Carreira, António - 1982)

• Left-dislocation and topicalization in Capeverdean creole (Braga, Maria Luiza: Ph.D. Dissertation, University of Pennsylvania - 1982; Examples in the Creole of São Vicente)

• Variation and change in the verbal system of Capeverdean crioulo (Silva, Izione Santos -1985: Análise da fonologia cabo-verdiana)

• Bilinguismo ou Diglossia (Duarte, Dulce Almada - 1998)

• O crioulo da ilha de S. Nicolau de Cabo Verde (Eduardo Augusto Cardoso - 1989)

• Kabuverdianu: Elementaria seiner TMA-Morphosyntax im lusokreolischen Vergleich (Thiele, Petra. Kabuverdianu: 1991)

• A Poética de Sérgio Frusoni - uma leitura antropológica (Mesquitela Lima: Lisboa - 1992: Poems in the Creole of São Vicente)

• "O princípio da parcimónia em crioulo de Cabo Verde" (Pereira, Dulce - 1992: in Actas do II. Colóquio sobre Crioulos de base lexical portuguesa, pp. 141-151)

• O crioulo de Cabo Verde: Introdução à gramática (Manuel Veiga - 1995; crioulo de Santiago e de São Vicente)

• Le créole du Cap-Vert. Etude grammaticale descriptive et contrastive (Manuel Veiga - 2000; exemplos em crioulo de São Vicente e de Santiago)

• Le Cap-Verdien: Origines et devenir d'une langue métisse (Nicolas Quint - 2000)

• Grammaire de la langue cap-verdienne: Étude descriptive et compréhensive du créole afro-portugais des Iles du Cap-Vert (Nicolas Quint, 2000)

• Dictionnaire Cap-Verdien/français (Nicolas Quint, 2000: Crioulo de Santiago)

• Dicionário do Crioulo da Ilha de Santiago - Alemão (ed. por Jürgen Lang: Tübingen 2002)

• The syntax of Cape Verdean Creole. The Sotavento Varieties (Baptista, Marlyse - 2002)

• Dicionário Prático Português Cabo-verdiano - Crioulo de Santiago (M. Mendes, N. Quint, F. Ragageles, A. Semedo: 2002)

• O Cabo-verdiano em 45 Lições (Manuel Veiga, 2002: Crioulo de Santiago e de São Vicente)

• Parlons capverdien : Langue et culture (Nicolas Quint, Aires Semedo, 2003: Creole of Santiago and one chapter about the creole of São Vicente)

See also

• Cape Verde - Language

External links

note: Ethnologue considers it one language, and names it Kabuberdianu, although the name is not used by Capeverdean crioulos speakers and others to refer to the language. Baltasar Lopes da Silva (Caleijão, São Nicolau, 23 April 1907 - São Vicente, 28 May 1989) was a writer, poet and linguist from Cape Verde, who wrote both in Portuguese and Creole. ... Luís Romano de Madeira Melo was born the 10th June in 1922 on the Capeverdean island of Santo Antão. ... Luís Romano de Madeira Melo was born the 10th June in 1922 on the Capeverdean island of Santo Antão. ... Sergio Frusoni (August 10, 1901 in the island of São Vicente - May 29, 1975) was a Capeverdean poet. ... Sergio Frusoni (August 10, 1901 in the island of São Vicente - May 29, 1975) was a Capeverdean poet. ... The Republic of Cape Verde or Cape Verde (Portuguese: Cabo Verde, pron. ...

• Kabuberdianu Ethnologue report on Capeverdean Crioulos.
• Criol language
• Creole grammars and dictionaries from Cape Verde
• A Perspective on Capeverdean Crioulo by Robert French
• Santiago Creole
• Literaturas Africanas (African literatures in the Portuguese language and Portuguese creoles, pdf: in Portuguese)

Look up Capeverdean Crioulo languages in Wiktionary, the free dictionary