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Haitian education is experiencing an interminable crisis stemming basically from two main factors: the problem of political and administrative governance and the weakness of the resulting educational policies. Another crisogenic factor is the initial choice to base this education on an experience of acculturation where learners have always been forced to be educated in French, a language they don’t practise, while they are fluent in Creole, their first language. This acculturation comes in particular from the fact that the first educators and heads of schools in Haiti were French who taught in French in the negation of Creole and who initiated the discourse of creolophobia which still persists today. But it is a pity that the takeover of the school by the nationals did not make it possible to regularize the situation. It therefore arises the need for an inculturation of the school, particularly on the linguistic field. It is obvious that the education system is in crisis, but that is not a fatality. On the contrary. Crises are a barometer that allows us to take the true pulse of the situation. They thus offer the opportunity for improvement, redefinition, adjustment, a new beginning. The problem is to be unable to get out of it or even to be able to recognize one’s critical situation as Haiti is experiencing it for several decades.

Haiti is facing an educational crisis that depends in part on a literacy crisis in a bilingual context where French is the main language of schooling, while Creole is the mother tongue of 100% of the population. This choice is at the origin of an educational system generating illiteracy, discouragement and school dropout and failure. In school and in all other spheres of formal activity, Haitians develop discriminatory behaviors that we call creolophobia, which prevents the Creole language from participating in the social transformation and development of the society. We analyze the consequences of schooling in French in the absence of Creole literacy by showing that this literacy crisis affects all public domains of social life. Based on social theories and multiple approaches to literacy, we advocate for a Creole literacy to introduce children to reading and writing in their mother tongue for their cognitive and socio-cultural development, which will allow them to participate in the development of the society, and to anticipate the various social crises related to this literacy problem. We opt for a school literacy focused on social practices, local situated and Haitian community practices.

L’État d’Haïti est né créolo-francophone. Son acte d’indépendance proclamée le 1er janvier 1804 est rédigé en français. Il est membre fondateur de l’OIF et de beaucoup d’organismes francophones. Son administration ne fonctionnait qu’en français jusque dans les années 1980, même s’il faudra attendre la Constitution de 1918 promulguée sous l’occupation américaine pour le voir reconnu officiel par la loi haïtienne. Le français est arrivé dans la Caraïbe en 1625, à Saint-Christophe, à un moment où il n’était pas encore une langue unifiée dans l’espace devenu aujourd’hui la France continentale. En 1635, en vue de l’unifier et le normaliser, le Cardinal de Richelieu va officialiser l’Académie française fondée en 1634. Le français va évoluer en se différenciant des variétés qui se développeront en France et dans d’autres colonies françaises établies en Amérique, dans l’océan Indien, dans le Pacifique et, plus tard, en Afrique de l’Ouest. Ainsi a émergé le français haïtien dont les spécificités se manifestent aux niveaux lexico-sémantique, phonologique et morphosyntaxique. Haïti sera le seul État américain de français langue officielle. Ainsi, il contribue à la diffusion du français et du fait francophone dans des organismes internationaux d’Amérique.

Une langue n’est jamais pratiquée de manière uniforme d’un lieu à un autre à l’intérieur d’une même communauté, voire d’une communauté linguistique à une autre. Ainsi, le français pratiqué en Haïti que Pompilus (1961), Govain (2008, 2009, 2013), Saint-Fort (2007), Fattier (2010) nomment le français haïtien (FH) est une variété de parler francophone propre à Haïti et différente à bien des égards des autres variétés de parlers francophones. Le FH n’est donc pas identique en tout point avec les autres variétés de parlers francophones, mais il existe entre toutes ces variétés une zone d’invariance qui garantit l’intercompréhension. Le français, arrivé dans l’espace qui va devenir Haïti aujourd’hui au cours de la première moitié du XVIIe siècle, va évoluer différemment des variétés de français qui vont se développer ici et là : le temps, l’espace et les générations agissent sur les pratiques linguistiques. Les spécificités du FH proviennent des normes endogènes qui sont facilitées par des expériences locales diverses, le créole haïtien, l’anglo-américain et l’espagnol. Elles se manifestent notamment au niveau lexico-sémantique, mais aussi phonologique, et dans une moindre mesure morphosyntaxique. Des différences lexico-sémantiques entre le FH et le français commun font naitre des faux-amis pouvant conduire à des problèmes d’interprétation chez les locuteurs de ces variétés. Cette contribution propose une brève description du FH à partir des productions d’étudiants de 1e année d’Université.

In 1937, more than 30,000 Haitians and Dominicans of Haitian descent were massacred in a few days by the army and the Dominican police forces under the presidency of Rafael Leónidas Trujillo Molina. This genocide remains little known in modern world history. It remains marked with the seal of the language and its use as a tool to detect the origin of the speakers. Indeed, the Spanish language was used through the specific word "perejil" (parsley) to identify individuals unable to pronounce "correctly" this term. If any hesitation or failure to production a proper /r/ ("r" rolled) followed by a /x/ (jota), it was death with a machete or a knife for most of the time. The notion of shibboleth makes it possible to discuss this criminal use of the language. We shall examine the socio-historical contextualization of these events and then put into perspective the phonological and pragmatic dimensions of such a term with deadly ends.

Le présent article ouvre la série de contributions du dossier portant sur la langue, l'un des principaux domaines de réflexion de Pierre Vernet. Il traite la question de l'agglutination entre un déterminant et un nom formant groupe nominal, laquelle agglutination renvoie à un phénomène courant en créole haïtien. Dans un premier temps, l'auteur présente quelques observables dans ce domaine, à la suite de quoi il s'intéresse aux manifestations phonologiques et aux traits sémantiques de ce type de manifestation verbale. Renauld Govain tente, à cette occasion, de fournir un classement des caractéristiques qu'il en a relevées à travers différents corpus.

The link between beta s-gene haplotypes and sickle cell anemia has permitted a better understanding of the biological manifestations of this disease. The use of better laboratory methods can help rule out other hereditary factors that can camouflage the real hemoglobin genotype. The clinical heterogeneity of sickle cell disease, which is characterized by the presence of S hemoglobin, can be explained in terms of fetal hemoglobin (HbF) levels, ratio of G gamma chains to A gamma chains, 2,3-diphosphoglycerate levels, linked mutations, beta s haplotypes, coexistence of alpha-thalassemia, and environmental factors. The inheritance of Sen and Arab/Indian beta-gene cluster polymorphisms is associated with a milder clinical course, whereas the Central African Republic (CAR) or Bantu, Cameroon, and Benin haplotypes are linked with severe sickle cell disease. The CAR haplotype carries the worst prognosis of all (less than 12% HbF levels and adult-type G gamma:A gamma ratio). Once characterized, these DNA polymorphisms also assume great importance as anthropologic and genetic markers. In America, beta s haplotypes are contributing to a better understanding of Black American roots and their African ancestry. There is ample evidence of genetic variability not only between different Black populations in America, but also within the same country, as is the case in Costa Rica.

The chromosome of Bordetella pertussis harbours a region of 27 contiguous kb, which contains the bvg, fha and fim genes, involved in the co-ordinate regulation of virulence genes, FHA production and fimbriae production, respectively. The linkage of FHA and fimbrial genes has resulted in some confusion concerning the existence and location of genes required for the production of FHA and the function of the fimbrial genes fimB-D, which were proposed to be involved in both FHA and fimbriae biosynthesis. Through the use of non-polar mutations in each of these genes, we found that fimB-D are required for the production of both serotype 2 and 3 fimbriae, but not for FHA biosynthesis. Furthermore, a large open reading frame, designated fhaC, was identified downstream of fimD. It was shown that fhaC is essential for FHA production but not for fimbriae biogenesis. We propose that insertion mutations in fimB-D affect FHA production because of polar effects on fhaC expression. An insertion in the region downstream of fhaC had only a slight effect on FHA and fimbriae production. The fhaC gene product shows homology with ShIB and HpmB, two outer membrane proteins involved in export and activation of the haemolysins, ShIA and HpmA, of Serratia marcescens and Proteus mirabilis, respectively. Homology is also observed between the N-termini of FHA, ShIA and HpmA. Export of the haemolysins requires the N-termini of these molecules, and when this region was removed from FHA by an in-frame deletion, FHA biosynthesis was abolished. These results suggest that the N-terminus of FHA interacts with FhaC, and that as a result FHA is transported across the outer membrane.

Structural hemoglobin variants are reviewed for Iberoamerica; specially in Latin America, they reflect racial composition and geographic origin. Latin American genetic composition is a function of ethnic composition in each country (mainly Africans and Spaniards, and the "indians" or native peoples). For this reason the distribution of hemoglobin variants has been greatly affected by the individual and population movements, specially as a result of the 18th and 19th century African slave trade. Scientific, sanitary, social and cultural factors explain (at least for Latin America and Portugal), a quantitative and qualitative subestimation of the structural variants of hemoglobin. In Spain, which has extensive research on the subject, the Caucasian variant number is known to be high, compared with Latin America and Portugal. Concerning origin and prevalence of hemoglobin polymorphism, the only established positive selection force is malaria falciparum. In Iberoamerica, the Hb S, as the major polymorphism and the HbC, have the greatest clinical and anthropological importance. Nevertheless, most variants are rare (found in an individual person or a particular family). Other minor Iberoamerica polymorphisms are the Hb E and D-Punjab, from Asia; and the Hb Korle-Bu, G-Philadelphia and A2 from Africa.

Filamentous haemagglutinin (FHA) is the major attachment factor produced by virulent Bordetella spp. Similar to the other virulence factors, its production is tightly regulated by a two-component system in response to environmental changes. Although of impressive size (c. 220 kDa), it is very efficiently released into the culture supernatant of Bordetella pertussis. Its biogenesis involves complex processing of a larger precursor with a calculated molecular mass of 370 kDa. Export of FHA into the culture medium depends on an outer membrane protein homologous to haemolysin accessory proteins. Purified extracellular FHA is able to increase the adherence of other pathogens to the host, which may contribute to super-infection in whooping cough. Although FHA- mutants colonize lungs as efficiently as the wild-type parent strains, immune responses against FHA appear to protect against colonization. Unlike many other adhesins, FHA expresses at least three different attachment activities, one specific for the CR3 integrins of macrophages, one involving a carbohydrate-binding site, specific for interactions with cilia, and a heparin-binding activity that may be important for interaction of B. pertussis with epithelial cells or extracellular matrices.

A review of hemoglobinopathies in the Caribbean basin, shows a clear association with race: In Costa Rica, evidence suggests two geographic origins for populations of African origin.