Biography
Artist, writer, and language activist Jonathan Mayers is a Louisiana Creole from Istrouma (Baton Rouge), LA. He is active in the language revitalization movement involving Kouri-Vini, the endangered Creole language of Louisiana. Created in the colloquial art form called Latannyèrizm, Mayers’ paintings and multilingual texts address environmental, social, and cultural issues in the Gulf South region. His poems, texts, or visual artwork can be found in various publications such as Folklore Figures of French and Creole Louisiana, Ti Liv Kréyòl, Feux Follets, Résonance, and The Iron Lattice among others. Mayers also curated the trilingual collaborative project called Mythologies Louisianaises and is currently represented by Arthur Roger Gallery in New Orleans.
Research
As a Louisiana Creole of French, German, and Acadian descent, I have often found myself searching for links to the past that will help to create a better present and future for myself and my community. Créolité, or Creole identity – sometimes referred to as Creoleness, is an identity that embraces hybridization between languages and cultures which often include those whose roots extend to West Africa and Southern Europe, yet is largely found in the Americas and off the African coast in the Indian Ocean. Americanization and Racialization in the U.S. has allowed for the Louisiana Creole identity to be mislabeled and misrepresented. My Créolité, often questioned due to my noticeable physical lack of melanin as it relates to African ancestry, is not based on skin tone, but defined by my culture, language, and community – of which my paternal ancestors were also a part. This project, whose focus rests on commonality through Créolité in the Gulf South region, various forms of solidarity amongst Louisiana Creoles – both historic and contemporary, and language (re)acquisition, will culminate in a multimedia format presenting experiences and stories of Louisiana Creoles accompanied by images, paintings, and narrative texts in Kouri-Vini, the critically endangered Creole language of Louisiana.
