중남미

There are several Creole languages which are used on the national level in Caribbean region. These languages have some features of European languages and African languages, because they derived from the pidgins used by south-north african slaves who were forced to settle in this region. Many pidgins disappeared as their necessity vanished. Such are the cases of the pidgins based on Spanish languages. But in the case of Haitian creole which is one of the creole languages based in French, it was nominated as the official language of the nation in 1983, parallel with the French. On the other side, Jamaican creole which is one of the creole languages based in English, is developed continually under the dominance of English as the official language of the nation. It has gained so many features of English that its speakers couldn't help mixing both languages in use. They neither speak English nor the creole language. What they speak is the post creole continuum. This is a kind of floating language between the two poles. In the case of Surinam, its official language is Dutch, though it is used by less than 2% of its population. So in the school neither the teachers nor the children understand the Dutch. They prefer creole languages like Djuka, Suranan and Samaraccan, or English. In this paper we observe the actual situation of the creole languages in Haiti, Jamaica and Surinam in detail to consider the perspective of this kind of languages in Caribbean region in general. For this purpose, in the second chapter we exam some theories about their origin and nature and in the following three chapters we look through the detailed situations of each nation.