Art Term

Creolisation

Originally a Caribbean concept, creolisation describes the mixing together of different people and cultures to become one

The term comes from the word creole, used to describe people born in the New World as opposed to those who were African-born slaves. The idea of creolisation gained prominence during the Second World War, when scholars, such as the Martinique poet and politician Aimé Césaire wrote about the ambiguities of Caribbean life and the cultural identity of black Africans in a colonial setting. In this respect, creolisation can be related to Négritude. Today the term creolisation is sometimes used to describe the cultural complexity of the world we live in and of the many diverse societies that exist within it.

  • Diaspora

    Diaspora is a term used to describe movements in population from one country to another and is often cited in discussions about identity

  • Négritude

    Négritude was an anti-colonial cultural and political movement founded by a group of African and Caribbean students in Paris in the 1930s who sought to reclaim the value of blackness and African culture

Close