Haitian Creole/Articles

Definite article

Singular nouns

Haitian Creole has a definite article, roughly corresponding to English "the" and French le/la. It is placed after the noun, and the sound varies by the last sound of the previous word. If the last sound is an oral consonant, and it is preceded by oral vowel, it becomes la. Recall that in Haitian Creole, y is always a consonant.

Haitian Creole	English
kravat la	the tie
liv la	the book
kay la	the house

If the last sound is an oral consonant and is preceded by a nasal vowel, it becomes lan:

Haitian Creole	English
lanp lan	the lamp
bank lan	the bank

If the last sound is an oral vowel, it becomes a:

Haitian Creole	English
kouto a	the knife
peyi a	the country

If the last sound is a nasal vowel, it becomes an:

Haitian Creole	English
chien an	the dog
pon an	the bridge

If the last sound is a nasal consonant (m, n or ng), it becomes nan:

Haitian Creole	English
machin nan	the car
telefòn nan	the telephone
madanm nan	the woman

Plural nouns

The definite article for any plural noun is yo. Recall that yo can also mean "they", "them" or "their".

Placement

The definite article goes after the noun, and also after anything that modifies the noun, including relative clauses.

Haitian Creole	English
zanmi mwen an	my friend
fè mwen konnen an	the fact [that] I know
bagay ki nan bwat li a	The thing that is in his/her/its box

Usage

The usage of the definite article is slightly different in Haitian Creole. It can be used to indicate singular vs. plural if the word sa is used with the same noun, or if there is a possessor indicated.

Haitian Creole	English
moun sa yo	these/those people
moun sa a	this/that person

Indefinite article

Recall that the indefinite article is yon. It means "a" or "an". It goes before the noun it modifies.

Extra Practice
A worksheet covering this material is available at Wikiversity.