22528: DeGraff: Re: 22509: Mambo Racine Re: 22496: Antoine: The Kathy Grey's stand on Haitian Creole (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: Michel DeGraff <degraff@MIT.EDU>


> I have mentioned on this list before that during my first kanzo, my
> first initiator, Houngan Luc Gedeon, foresaw that I would have a
> wide international audience, and he gave me my first nom vayan  in
> French and required me to write it in French.

Will Ms. Grey please tell us which variety of French "Bon Mambo Racine
Sans Bout" is from?  Would it be a variety of French where adjectives
do not accord with the nouns they qualify?  I am assuming that "mambo"
is French is still feminine and that French "bon" is still masculine
(contrast with "bonne" which is feminine). Thus, in the varieties of
French that I am most familiar with, there is no such thing as a "bon
mambo".  And of course all Haitians I know would readily say "bon
manbo" when speaking Creole, and so would Mr. Luc Gedeon. Please note
spelling "manbo", in accord with Haitian Creole's official
orthography.  And the word is usually pronounced as the following
sequence of phonemes: the consonant "m", the nasal vowel represented
by the digraph "an", the consonant "b" and the vowel "o", thus the
correct spelling "manbo" according to the 1979 orthography law (see
references below).

Of course, "Bon Mambo" in Grey's title would be OK in standard
varieties of French in the eventuality that Ms. Grey were actually a
man by the name of "Mambo".  Such eventuality would make "Bon Mambo" a
perfectly grammatical French sentence.

So, is the "Bon Mambo ..." a man?  That too, like much in linguistics,
is an empirical issue that can be discovered by straightforward
observation without appeal to any mysticism.

Inquiring minds are wondering...

                                 -michel.

P.S.  Some handy references on Haitian Creole orthography (also see
Guy Antoine's website http://haitiforever.com/bbs/index.html ):

  Bernard, J. (1980)
  "Ki jan nou ekri kreyol ayisyen''
  [Reprint of communique on Haitian Creole's official orthography].
  Etudes Creoles 3:1.

  Dejean, Yves.  (1985)
  Ann aprann otograf kreyol la.
  Port-au-Prince, Haiti: State Secretariat for Literacy.

  Vernet, Pierre.  (1980).
  Techniques d'Ecriture du Creole Haitien.
  Port-au-Prince, Haiti: Imprimerie Le Natal.

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