KRISTY RAM­NAR­INE

kristy.ram­nar­ine@cnc3.co.tt

French Am­bas­sador Di­di­er Chabert is call­ing for the teach­ing of the French lan­guage in schools to be main­tained and strength­ened.

He was speak­ing at the an­nu­al Bastille Day cel­e­bra­tions at the French Em­bassy in St Clair on Mon­day. The event marked the 236th an­niver­sary of the Storm­ing of the Bastille.

Am­bas­sador Chabert, whose diplo­mat­ic term in T&T comes to an end this year, em­pha­sised that the shared cul­tur­al her­itage be­tween both na­tions must re­main a liv­ing one.

“I am grate­ful to the Min­istry of Ed­u­ca­tion for the sup­port pro­vid­ed in this re­gard,” he said.

He al­so praised the work of the Al­liance Française:

“Thanks to the in­flu­ence, dy­namism and pro­fes­sion­al­ism of the Al­liance Française in pro­mot­ing our lan­guage and cul­ture. Un­der the dy­nam­ic lead­er­ship of its new Di­rec­tor, Mrs Any­ka Bat­tista, this ven­er­a­ble Trinida­di­an in­sti­tu­tion, es­tab­lished in 1952, of­fers an un­par­al­leled range of French-lan­guage train­ing, tai­lored to the needs of each stu­dent.

“You will not on­ly be able to learn French and ob­tain in­ter­na­tion­al cer­ti­fi­ca­tion, but al­so par­tic­i­pate in cul­tur­al, recre­ation­al and fes­tive ac­tiv­i­ties.”

Am­bas­sador Chabert high­light­ed the deep and var­ied roots of the re­la­tion­ship be­tween T&T and France, trac­ing back to French set­tlers.

“Some of them, who were un­for­tu­nate­ly slave own­ers, came to Trinidad and To­ba­go, con­tribut­ing to the de­vel­op­ment of an au­then­tic Trinida­di­an cul­ture by blend­ing French, African, In­di­an and Span­ish el­e­ments,” he not­ed.

“Many as­pects of French cul­ture re­main present in Trinidad. First, in mu­sic, where Ca­lyp­so emerged as an ex­tra­or­di­nary fu­sion be­tween melod­ic lines from French An­til­lean mu­sic and au­then­ti­cal­ly African rhythms, mak­ing it ab­solute­ly unique. The first ca­lyp­son­ian, Gros Jean, sang in French Cre­ole.

“We have just cel­e­brat­ed the 90th birth­day of Mighty Spar­row. Let me re­mind you that one of his great hits, Sa Sa Ye, re­leased in 1965, was writ­ten and sung large­ly in pa­tois, French Cre­ole. I will not speak about the sub­ject of this song, to avoid mak­ing the ladies blush.”

He al­so point­ed to the French in­flu­ence on lan­guage:

“French Cre­ole was spo­ken by many un­til rel­a­tive­ly re­cent­ly. To­day, it re­mains im­pres­sive­ly pre­served in a few places, in­clud­ing the vil­lage of Paramin, world-fa­mous for its blue dev­ils.

“But the most spec­tac­u­lar cul­tur­al in­flu­ence of France in Trinidad and To­ba­go is, of course, Car­ni­val,” he added. “We cel­e­brate Di­manche Gras, Mar­di Gras, J’ou­vert, and we see Dame Lor­raine, Pier­rot Grenade, Jab Mo­lassie, Min­strels and oth­er tra­di­tion­al por­tray­als of French ori­gin.”

Act­ing Per­ma­nent Sec­re­tary in the Min­istry of For­eign and Cari­com Af­fairs, Ran­dall Karim, echoed these sen­ti­ments, not­ing that con­nec­tions be­tween the two coun­tries pre­date the for­mal es­tab­lish­ment of diplo­mat­ic re­la­tions in 1962.

“Sign­posts pro­vid­ing di­rec­tions to places like Bonasse, Sans Souci, Bon Ac­cord and else­where re­veal the French in­flu­ence,” he said.

“Ves­tiges of French set­tle­ment in the 1700s linger not on­ly on the lips of the tal­ent­ed ones who can con­verse in pa­tois but are in­ter­spersed in our every­day ver­nac­u­lar, from lov­ing ex­pres­sions like doudou or doux-doux to those rife with comess and an­i­ma­tion in pa­payo.”

Karim al­so high­light­ed re­flec­tions of French her­itage in lo­cal ar­chi­tec­ture:

“Re­flec­tions abound in our built her­itage, in the cast iron el­e­ments in Hayes Court, the French Provin­cial style of Mille Fleurs, or the French Sec­ond Em­pire style of Roomor. The late his­to­ri­an An­ge­lo Bisses­sars­ingh re­called that George Brown, one of the pi­o­neers of our sig­na­ture Gin­ger­bread style, ‘drew on in­spi­ra­tions from both French and Eng­lish schools of thought.’”

He cit­ed the French Clas­si­cal Mu­sic Con­cert, held in col­lab­o­ra­tion with the Em­bassy in April, and La Fête de la Musique in June, as prime ex­am­ples of cul­tur­al un­der­stand­ing and ex­change be­tween the two na­tions.