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Haitian Creole (/ˈheɪʃən ˈkriːoʊl/; Haitian Creole: Kreyòl ayisyen;French: Créole haïtien), commonly referred to as simply Creole, or Kreyòl in the Creole language, is a French-based creole language spoken by 10–12 million people worldwide, and is one of the two official languages of Haiti, where it is the native language of a majority of the population.[9]

The language emerged from contact between French settlers and enslaved Africans during the Atlantic slave trade in the French colony of Saint-Domingue (now Haiti) in the 17th and 18th centuries. Although its vocabulary largely derives from 18th-century French, its grammar is that of a West African Volta-Congo language branch, particularly the Fongbe language and Igbo language. It also has influences from Spanish, English, Portuguese, Taino, and other West African languages. It is not mutually intelligible with standard French, and has its own distinctive grammar. Haitians are the largest community in the world speaking a modern creole language.

The usage of, and education in, Haitian Creole has been contentious since at least the 19th century; some Haitians view French as a legacy of colonialism because Creole was maligned by francophones as a miseducated person's French. Until the late 20th century, Haitian presidents spoke only standard French to their fellow citizens, and until the 2000s, all instruction at Haitian elementary schools was in modern standard French, a second language to most of their students.

Haitian Creole is also spoken in various other regions around the world that include: different islands in the Caribbean, French Guiana, France, the Francophone region of Africa, as well as Francophone Canada, and the Dominican Republic.

Origins
Haitian Creole contains elements from both the Romance group of Indo-European languages through its superstrate, French, substrate, Fongbe, as well as influences from African languages. There are many theories on the formation of the Haitian Creole language.

One theory estimates that Haitian Creole developed between 1680 and 1740. During the 16th and 17th centuries, French and Spanish colonizers produced tobacco, cotton, and sugar cane on the island. Throughout this period, the population was made of roughly equal numbers of engagés (white workers), gens de couleur libres (free people of colour) and slaves. The economy shifted into sugar production in 1690, just before the French colony of Saint-Domingue was officially formed in 1697. The sugar crops needed a much larger labor force, which led to an increase in slave importation. In the 18th century an estimated 800,000 West-African individuals were enslaved and brought to Saint-Domingue.

Many African slaves in French ownership were from Niger-Congo-speaking territory, and particularly from Kwa languages such as Gbe from West Africa and the Central Tano languages and Bantu languages from Central Africa. Singler suggests that the number of Bantu speakers decreased while the number of Kwa speakers increased, with Gbe being the most dominant group. The first fifty years of Saint‑Domingue's sugar boom coincided with emergent Gbe predominance in the French Caribbean. In the interval during which Singler hypothesizes the language evolved, the Gbe population was around 50% of the imported slave population.

Classical French (français classique) and langues d'oïl (Norman, Poitevin and Saintongeais dialects, Gallo and Picard) were spoken during the 17th and 18th centuries in Saint‑Domingue, as well as in New France and French West Africa. Enslaved individuals lacked a mode of communication and as a result would try to learn French to communicate with one another. With the constant importation of slaves, the language was increasingly used and gradually became distinct from French. The language was also picked up by other members of the community and became used by the majority of those born in what is now Haiti.

Difference between Haitian Creole and French
Haitian Creole and French have similar pronunciations and share many lexical items. In fact, over 90% of the Haitian Creole vocabulary is of French origin, therefore also classifying it as a Romance language. However, many cognate terms actually have different meanings. For example, as Valdman mentions in Haitian Creole: Structure, Variation, Status, Origin, the word for "frequent" in French is fréquent; however, its cognate in Haitian Creole frekan means 'insolent, rude, and impertinent' and usually refers to people. In addition, the grammars of Haitian Creole and French are very different. For example, in Haitian Creole, verbs are not conjugated as they are in French. Additionally, Haitian Creole possesses different phonetics than standard French, however is similar in phonetic structure. The phrase-structure is another similarity between Haitian Creole and French but differs slightly in that it contains details from its African substratum language.

The Fon language, also known as the Fongbe language, is a modern Gbe language native to Benin, Nigeria and Togo in West Africa. This language has a grammatical structure similar to Haitian Creole, possibly making Creole a relexification of Fon with vocabulary from French. The two languages are often compared:

Becoming an official language
The Constitution of 1987 upgraded Haitian Creole to a national language alongside French. It classified French as the langue d'instruction or "language of instruction", and Creole was classified as an outil d'enseignement or a "tool of education". The Constitution of 1987 names both Haitian Creole and French as the official languages, but recognizes Haitian Creole as the only language that all Haitians hold in common.: 263 French is spoken by only a small percentage of citizens. [removed portion of sentence that was repetitive of previous]

Literature development
Even without government recognition, by the end of the 19th century, there were already literary texts written in Haitian Creole such as Oswald Durand's Choucoune and Georges Sylvain's Cric? Crac!. Félix Morisseau-Leroy was another influential author of Haitian Creole work. Since the 1980s, many educators, writers, and activists have written literature in Haitian Creole. In 2001, Open Gate: An Anthology of Haitian Creole Poetry was published. It was the first time a collection of Haitian Creole poetry was published in both Haitian Creole and English. On 28 October 2004, the Haitian daily Le Matin first published an entire edition in Haitian Creole in observance of the country's newly instated "Creole Day".: 556Haitian Creole writers often use different literary strategies throughout their works, such as code-switching, to increase the audiences knowledge on the language. Literature in Haitian Creole is also used to educate the public on the dictatorial social and political forces in Haiti.