Creolization

<p>Creolization is the process through which <a href="/facts/Creole_languages/vrnq31TV">creole languages</a> and cultures emerge. Creolization was first used by linguists to explain how <a href="/facts/Language_contact/xU290Qnk">contact languages</a> become creole languages, but now scholars in other social sciences use the term to describe new cultural expressions brought about by contact between societies and relocated peoples. Creolization is traditionally used to refer to the <a href="/facts/Caribbean/zRI9aMCh">Caribbean</a>, although it is not exclusive to the Caribbean and some scholars use the term to represent other <a href="/facts/Diasporas/jAEHerxI">diasporas</a>. Furthermore, creolization occurs when participants select cultural elements that may become part of inherited culture. Sociologist <a href="/facts/Robin_Cohen/M4BqfwKC">Robin Cohen</a> writes that creolization occurs when “participants select particular elements from incoming or inherited cultures, endow these with meanings different from those they possessed in the original cultures, and then creatively merge these to create new varieties that supersede the prior forms.”
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Creolization open-in-new

Creolization