Community Outreach

Goal 2 - To provide Louisiana citizens with information about and opportunities to develop the State’s Cajun, Creole and Francophone Native American linguistic and cultural heritage.

Information

From its inception, the CODOFIL office has become the information center for anything about Louisiana and its francophone cultures, as well as for Louisiana citizens looking for information about the francophone world. We spell Laissez les bons temps rouler! and Bienvenue en Louisiane. We connect people with different university French departments, bookstores carrying French literature, France-Louisiane in Paris, the French consulate in New Orleans, the French Community of Belgium in Baton Rouge. We answer hundreds of calls, e-mails and faxes from teachers around the world interested in teaching French in Louisiana. We handle scores of messages about our scholarship program and other possibilities of foreign study and exchange programs. We forward messages to schools about exchange programs, to internet community groups about genealogy or language questions. We do on the spot translations of historical documents. We serve as an impromptu tourist bureau for the francophone world. Daily, we welcome folks from around the United States and the world and answer questions about French in Louisiana. We publicize francophone and cultural events.

Community Outreach

One of the marvels of the Louisiana francophone community is its diversity. Louisiana francophones are found in north Louisiana in Shreveport, in Pierre Part in the Atchafalaya Basin, on the New Orleans West Bank, in the immersion programs throughout southern Louisiana, in Lafayette, as well as most of the university campuses. Despite their differences, the communities of Creole and Cajun speakers, as well as the Native American communities of Houmas and Choctaw, communicate with each other daily. The goal of our community outreach program is to work with all of these communities to support existing programs such as literacy and theater projects, develop new projects, such as creating new espaces francophones, and develop better communication between the communities.

ABC 2000

During the many years when French was considered an inferior language spoken only by those with no choice, reading and writing French were not skills in high demand. Additionally, very few French reading materials were available and rarely would one need to write French. During the first half of the 20th century, Louisiana francophones were forbidden to speak, much less read or write French. Another CODOFIL initiative, the ABC 2000 adult literacy program was designed to teach 2000 adults to read and write French before the year 2000. The year 2000 has come and gone, but the goal of offering reading and writing skills to Louisiana francophones remains the same.

French Louisiana Literature

While the number of Louisiana residents capable of reading French continues to rise, CODOFIL is also working to give them something to read. Before the Civil War, a French literary community flourished in Louisiana, where numerous classically and romantically-styled novels, short stories, poems and plays were produced. As the reading population dwindled, a rich oral tradition (in the form of songs and folk tales) continued to thrive, but written production disappeared. Since the publication of Lâche pas la patate by Revon Reed in 1976 (the first novel written in Cajun French), a literary renaissance has begun, and Louisiana can boast of an ever-growing body of French literature. In fact, three collections of Louisiana poetry were published in Acadia since 1998, and othersuch publications are also planned to be released soon. Additionally, Feux Follets : Anthologie de la nouvelle louisianaise was published in 1998 in Lafayette. CODOFIL encourages such production through various literary awards and through its Soirées de Paroles et Musique, evenings devoted to readings and discussions of contemporary Louisiana French literature.
The students of the French Department of Centenary College under the able guidance of their professor, Dr. Dana Kress, have created a web site for Louisiana French literature. The ever-expanding site includes works of poetry from the 19th century to present day, as well as entire 19th century novels. Click here to view Louisiana French literature.

LA Gazette de Louisiane

CODOFIL also encourages written production in French through its bi-monthly newsletter LA Gazette de Louisiane. This newsletter is circulated to approximately 2000 subscribers around Louisiana and the world. The goals of LA Gazette are manifold: to report on everything affecting the status of the French language in Louisiana; to provide a glimpse at Louisiana's burgeoning French literature; to aid teachers of French around the state by offering information on resources available to teachers; to preview up-coming events of interest to CODO-philes; and, in general, to show the world that the French language is alive and well in Louisiana.

Média-Louisiane

French is alive in Louisiana, and nowhere is this more evident than on the radio-waves of the state. The majority of Louisiana residents have access to French language programming in their homes through international programs such as Radio France International and through locally-produced shows dedicated to the Cajun, Creole, and Jazz musics of Louisiana. Additionally, many viewers around the state have access to locally-produced and internationally-originated television programming as well. Média-Louisiane is an organization sponsored by CODOFIL and the CODOFIL Foundation which supports Francophone media in Louisiana and encourages through grants the media outlets of the state to dedicate more time to French broadcasting. No matter how many students study French in Louisiana schools, CODOFIL realizes that unless French remains present in the homes and streets of the state these efforts will be insufficient.

For more information about Louisiana's French media, including a listing of television and radio resources, click here.