Prior to English being designated as the official language, French Creole was more prominent throughout the island.
Consequently, government and educational institutions endorsement of the language change significantly influenced the progressive transition and phaseout of French Creole to English Creole.
Trinidadian English Creole is also influenced by French, French Creole, Trinidadian Hindustani, Tamil, other South Asian languages, Spanish, Portuguese, Chinese (mainly Cantonese, with some Hakka, and now Mandarin), and Arabic.
The island also has a creole with a largely French lexicon, which was in widespread use until the late nineteenth century, when it started to be gradually replaced, due to influence and pressure from the British.
[6] Although there is considerable variation, some generalizations can be made about the speech of Trinidad: Both Trinidad and Tobago[13] feature creole continua between more conservative Creole forms and forms much closer to Trinidadian English, with the former being more common in spontaneous speech and the latter in more formal speech.