WEBVTT

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Hi guys.

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(sigh)

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This is a response to my video "Les 
consequences du Francais en Haiti"

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which I did it in French talking about the
consequences of French in Haiti.

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I published this in April and I have the 
link to it up here and down there

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in my description box.

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I got some really strong reactions to 
that post and it seems like I really hit a

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nerve for some people so I'm dedicating
this week's message to response and debunk

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the prevalent counter arguments I received

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Here are the main points I made 
in that video:

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"French hinders comunication in 
self-expression among Haitians

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It divides the Haitian population and
fosters an inferiority complex for the

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majority of the population.

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Haitions sustitute someone's ability to 
muster a few words in French for wisdom or

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intelligence.Haitions fail to realize that
what they are seeing is more important

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than the language they used to say in.

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And lastly, Haitians by and large cannot 
speak French.

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These are fairly common and well-known
issues I presented to support my proposal

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of eliminating French as one of the two
official languages of Haiti.

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But many didn't want to hear it and here 
are some of the responses that I want to

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address.

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The first one is that the problem of Haiti
is one of education not of language.

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Here is my issue with that point.

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Everyone knows that the state of education
in Haiti is dire, that has always been the

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case in Haiti but have you stopped to 
think that language is the basis of

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learning and education, so if you are 
attempting to teach in a language that is

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cumbersome, unnatural and foreign to kids
then you keep them at a disadvantage.

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The medium that allows you to communicate
the knowledge you are attempting to pass

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on is extremely relevant.

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My experience as a student in Haiti was
that many of my teachers were not fluent

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in French, far from.

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So yes, there is an educational crisis in
Haiti and this isn't breaking news to

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anyone. But the fact that we are insisting
on sticking to French as the academic

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language is to our own detriment.

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It is pedagogically impractical and 
frankly at this point pretty irresponsible

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The other thing people say that kind of 
goes along with the lack of education

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argument is that well, we shouldn't just 
limit our kids to Creole we should teach

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them French, Spanish, German, Italian, 
everything.

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Ok, well, do I want our kids to learn 
multiple languages?

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Of course.

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I would like every little Haitian out 
there to know as many languages as the

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human brain can retain and my argument has
never been to eradicate French from

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Haitian schools but rather to repeal its
status as an official language of the

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of Haiti and instead prioritize Creole 
which is the language that every last

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Haitian speaks.

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Luxembourg has 3 official languages.

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One of them I'm sure most of people have 
never heard of, it's called Luxembourgish

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and it is the language that is indigenous
to its people, the language of the heart

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for them so to speak.

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Even though, not many people outside of 
Luxembourg use it, that is the language

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that kids are taught in the first year of 
primary school before switching to German

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and then French.

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And proficiency and all three of their
official languages is required for

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graduation from secondary school.

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Now as you can see they are somehow able 
to pull off a

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trilingual educational system to go along
with the fact that they have 3 offical

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languages meaning their important 
legislature, and official national affairs

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are recorded and reported steadily in all
3 of these languages,

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even the one that we've never heard of.

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What's the point of this little sidebar?

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Well, it isn't a sidebar at all.

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It is to answer to the people who would
rather say: let's just teach our Haitian

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kids every language on the planet instead 
of focusing on teaching them in their

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primary language, Creole.

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A language that is said to be official in
our country yet all the important business

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political, professional and administrative
dealings are not recorded or reported

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in Creole.

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Over the years, when nationally elected
officials address the population,

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they deliver speeches in French and all 
while everyone knows that Creole

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is the language.

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Creole is constitutionally one of our 
official language but that's only"a L'oral

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like people say, meaning it's only 
something we say.

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Have we even tried to apply it in that
capacity?

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Have we even tried before we start crying
how it is unsustainable as a global means

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of communication for our children?

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What kills me is that these people 
objecting so passionately against the

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removal of French are the first to boast 
that we defeated French in 1804

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and that's the one thing from which they
derive Haitian pride, yet they don't

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realize that they are perpetuating 
oppression,

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holding stubbornly onto the language and 
the ways of the French at the expense of

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their own culture.

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For those of you telling me that back in
the days, you and your friends used to

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speak French, that's like me say every 
Haitian speaks English because my friends

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and I speak it.

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That doesn't mean anything.

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If you look at the data, education has 
always been a privilege reserved for the

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very few in Haiti and only the educated
can manage to speak a little French in

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Haiti ergo.

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Certain people's experiences back in the 
day when things were a little bit better

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for some doesn't demonstrate that at some
point French worked in Haiti.

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It never did and never will.

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Now, the other argument I got quite a bit 
is that we can't get rid of French

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because we need something to keep us 
connected to the rest of the world and

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people were also saying that having a 
Creole take-over

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now would set us back because we would 
have to start from scratch

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since Creole is such an unformulated
language.

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Ok, first of all, I hate to break it to 
you but the world has left Haiti behind

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a long time ago, and it's not just because
our people don't speak French,

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it's because we have not invested or
educated our people.

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Speaking French is not what's going to get
connected or keep us connected to the

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world because we don't need French to
facilitate international exchanges

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and to implement French as a language of
the Haitian people would require the same

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effort as to implement any other language
outside of Creole.

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With Creole we have an advantage,

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that's our mother tongue, we already 
speak it.

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We have to make the distinction:

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To teach French is not the same as 
educating our people.

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Here in the USA, everyone speaks the same
language, yet you will see that an

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uneducated person cannot articulate or
express themselves.

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The reason why our Creole-speaking masses
sound uneducated oftentimes

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is because they are uneducated,not because
they are speaking Creole.

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However, French can make a smart and 
educated Haitian sound stupid

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And a stupid Haitian who can remember 
their French vocab and grammar rules is

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oftentimes reveal and considered smart,no
matter how dimwitted they might be.

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There is something really wrong with this
picture.

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I was lucky enough to listen to Maurice
Sixto at a young age and discovered how

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he was able to claim such profound, 
culturally relevant,poetic and educational

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stories in Creole.

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He was well spoken and most importantly
Haitians could understand and truly

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connect with the deeper meaning of what
he was sharing.

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Back then, he wielded the Creole language,
which some attempt to devoid of all

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virtues, brilliantly, because he was 
educated.

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He was able to use his imagination and
talent to enrich the language.

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Had there been more of an encouragement
for self-expression in Creole and Haiti

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and respect for the language, no doubt, it
would be at a more refined stage today.

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That's what happened when something is 
yours, when you care about something,

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you work at it.

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That's your responsibility.

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You don't just sit and say it will never 
work because the languages that are so

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sophisticated today weren't always that
way;

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people developed them, people made them
great.

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They didn't just sit and say let's adopt
another language that's already developed

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to help us assimilate and sound educated.

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That being said, I appreciate that fact 
that we need to equip our children with

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the tools to compete on a global level

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and that includes language skills

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but that doesn't preclude us from 
strengthening and valuing our own language

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in our own country and taking advantage of
it to educate our children.

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Keeping that in mind, if I had to choose 
the second mandatory language for the

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education in Haiti, for our kids to know 
inside and out, it would definitely not

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be French because in today's world,

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French is struggling to remain revelant.

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That has been the trend for some time now,
you can check out the links to a few

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articles I posted to support that 
statement in the description box.

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Listen my Haitian people, generally 
speaking, we don't speak French,

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me included, and here are the reasons why.

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Speaking a language is not about knowing
some of the grammar or being able to read

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and write or understand it.

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It's about living the language, hearing it
and feeling it.

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I know some kids who were tragically
forbidden by their parents in Haiti to

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utter of a word of Creole growing up in 
Haiti,

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yet they still didn't speak French what 
they did was essentially translate Creole

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phrases into French like for example

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"envoie les yeux pour moi s'il te plait"
(true story)

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Now, is it grammatically correct, sure,
is it French?

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I'll leave that up to you to decide.

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Of course you can interact very well with 
a native French speaker but communicating

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successfully to another Haitian in French
is much harder.

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Short of constantly immersing ourselves in
French in the French culture through up to

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date literature, cinema, or other creative
work,

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we really cannot keep up with the language

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So yeah, we don't speak French and it's ok
it's not the end of the world.

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What's not ok is people, my people, not

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capable of rationally debating a critical 
issues in our Haitian society.

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People who will tell me "well why aren't
you speaking Creole?"

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meanwhile their kids probably don't speak
a lick of Creole let alone the French that

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they are so loudly and mindlessly 
defending,

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people who are blinded by their bias.

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I said it in my other video and I'll 
repeat it now.

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I love the French language.

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My favourite recording artist this season
is actually Belgian.

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I am so grateful that I was afforded the
opportunity to learn French.

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Many Haitians don't get that opportunity.

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And I will pass on as much appreciation
for French to my kids as I can because the

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issue is not and has never been the
language; the issue is the many Haitian

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people who simply refuse to wake up.

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Once again, my name is Marli, I am a Haiti
hope ambassador and Wake up Haitians,

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seriously.