FIU explores the roles of Creole and French in Haiti and the United States

On March 22, 2010, FIU’s Department of Modern Languages is hosting two lectures by Albert Valdman, Rudy Professor Emeritus of French, Italian and Linguistics at Indiana University. The lectures are co-sponsored by FIU’s School of International and Public Affairs and the Latin American and Caribbean Center.

Valdman is director of the Creole Institute at Indiana University. He served as chair of the Department of Linguistics, directed the French program and the summer institutes for Haitian Creole bilingual teachers. He has held Guggenheim, NATO-NSF, Fulbright and Senior Fulbright fellowships. His research spans a broad range of areas in applied and descriptive linguistics, including second language acquisition, pidgin and creole studies, and French linguistics. His publications include Le créole: structure, statut et origine (1978), Theoretical Orientations in Creole Studies (ed, 1980), Historicity and Variation in Creole Studies (co-ed, 1980), Haitian Creole-French-English Dictionary (1983), French and Creole in Louisiana (ed, 1997), A Dictionary of Louisiana Creole (collab-1998), Haitian Creole-English Bilingual Dictionary (collab-2007), Bien entendu: Introduction à la phonétique française (1993), Le français en Amérique du Nord, (ed. collab., 2005), and Dictionary of Louisiana French: As Spoken by Cajun, Creole, and American Indian Communities (collab, 2009).  He is founder and editor-in-chief of the journal Studies in Second Language Acquisition and review editor for linguistics of the French Review.

The two presentations are free and open to all FIU students and community members. For more information, please call 305-348-2851.

“Reconsidering the Roles of Creole and French in the Reconstruction of Haiti”
March 22, 2010 | 10 a.m. | GL 220

“French in the United States: Will it Survive?”
March 22, 2010 | 2 p.m. | GL 220