Dr. Valdman, World Renowned Creolist, will be presenting in English about the different variations of the Haitian Creole language that are spoken throughout Haiti and in the Haitian diaspora communities.

Dr. Valdman taught at the Foreign Service Institute of the U.S. Department of State and at Pennsylvania State University before joining Indiana University in 1960, where he holds the title of Rudy Professor Emeritus of French & Italian and Linguistics. He served as first chair of the Department of Linguistics, founded the Creole Institute and was Director of French Language Instruction in the Department of French and Italian. He has held visiting appointments at the University of the West Indies (Jamaica), the University of Nice, Harvard University, and the University of Oregon.

His research and teaching span a broad range of areas in applied and descriptive linguistics, including second language acquisition research, foreign language teaching, creole studies, and French linguistics. He is one of the pioneer researchers in the study of French language outside of France, especially in Louisiana (Le Français hors de France (ed., 1979); Le Français en Amérique du Nord: Etat présent (2005); Dictionary of Louisiana French: As Spoken in Cajun, Creole, and American Indian Communities (collab., 2010). (Description from Indiana University website)

This spring a virtual group, Haitian Creole in Higher Education Speaker Series Conversation Club, is taking place which is a 10-week pilot initiative where once a week, Haitian Creole speakers in higher education will meet for one hour. All meetings will take place on Fridays at 3pm Eastern time and will require the Zoom registration link to join which will stay the same for each week. Every week a different speaker from a different type of initiative will speak for 20-25 minutes about their program, followed by a question and answer group discussion period. Please contact Amanda Brinton at ab86@ufl.edu with any questions.

Fridays, 3pm Eastern time Jan 29th - April 2nd

Registration Link

Disclaimer: This event is not sponsored by the Haitian Studies Association.