SARGASSO


 I

 Every colonized people. .finds itself face
 to face with the language of the civilizing
 nation; that is, with the culture of the mother
 country. The colonized is elevated above his
 jungle status in proportion to his adoption
 of the mother country's cultural standards.
 Frantz Fanon (1967: 18)

 Ti parole fait grand zaffais.
 Creole proverb

 The French first set foot in the West Indies in
1626. Guadeloupe and Martinique became French possessions
in 1635 and remained so, with the exception of three
brief occupations by the English, until the end of World
War II when the colonies themselves voted to become
Departements d'Outre-Mer (D.O.M.). It is important to
know that, from the earliest days, the French by their
systematic extermination of the original inhabitants and
by the introduction of sugar cane and black slaves from
Africa as early as 1640, actively promoted acceptance of
all that would eventually be imported from abroad:
language, culture, law, and authority. Methods of
repression (physical violence, forced baptism, destruction
of African customs) during the era of slavery gave way
in time to methods of persuasion, until finally the French
language itself came to be given as a means to take on
a world and a culture.

 Traditionally, the assumption was that black people
of the Antilles wanted to speak French because it was a
key to open doors, to advance socially, and to get a job.
But more important, to speak French also meant "I made
an effort to assimilate, to rise above my non-culture--
the fact that I express myself well is a symbol of my
good intentions."

 The language spoken officially in the French islands
today is French. Yet there exists, at the same time,
a disharmony between this "legitimate" language and the
language of the people, which is Creole. Creole was
formerly considered an inferior or infantile form of