Language experts estimate as many as 10,000 people still speak the French-based language Louisiana Creole .
The celebrations include autumn's Festival Acadiens et Creoles , summer's Creole Tomato Festival , and spring's Tremé Creole Gumbo & Congo Square Rhythms Festival .
But for locals and visitors alike , everyday evidence shows how strong Creole culture is in Louisiana .
The state's performance spaces and airwaves are often filled with the driving , rhythmic sound of zydeco and other Creole and Cajun music .
Louisiana's restaurants offer dishes with rich , complex flavors including gumbo , hot sausage , red beans and rice , and shrimp étouffée .
“To celebrate Creole culture is to wake up and live in New Orleans ,” said Christina Bragg .
She is a member of the Mahogany Blue Babydolls , a parade group for Black and mixed-race women .
“Celebrating Creole is celebrating our day-to-day lives .
The food we eat .
The music we dance to .
The way we gather with friends to parade during Mardi Gras ," she said .
"Every day I open my eyes and breathe , it's a celebration of Creole culture , because that's who I am .”
So , what is Creole ?
“It's food , it's music , it's architecture , it's style and it's traditions ,” Mona Lisa Saloy told VOA .
“There are millions of Creole people in countries across the world…we are all so much more alike than we are different .
We create beautiful cultures everywhere we go , and I think that's evident here in Louisiana .”
Saloy is the writer of the poetry collection Black Creole Chronicles and served as Louisiana's poet laureate from 2021 to 2023 .
She said Creole cultures all over the world have similarities to Louisiana's .
How the word "Creole " is defined changes from place to place and person to person .
The word “Creole ” is believed to have come from the Portuguese word crioulo , which developed from the Latin word for “to create .”
The word took on different meanings in different places .
Creole in much of Africa and part of the Caribbean , for example , came to mean people of mixed ethnic or racial backgrounds .
In Louisiana , the definition has changed over the years .
He is a New Orleans-based Creole and owner of a local restaurant , the Vaucresson Sausage Company .
“I prefer an inclusive definition ,” he said .
“By that definition , anyone born in Louisiana could be Creole .
Describing his definition , Vaucresson added : “…it doesn't matter .
If you're born here and embrace the culture , you can be Creole .”
In Louisiana of the 1700s and 1800s , the more inclusive definition was possibly the most accepted .
White people with European ancestry were just as likely to call themselves Creole as mixed-race people of African ancestry .
Mixed-race Creoles , too , claimed the term because it differentiated them from enslaved people .
Don Vappie is a Creole jazz musician in New Orleans .
He described the idea of Creole before the Civil war as organized into three levels .
After the American Civil War , however , many of these differences in New Orleans disappeared .
“Creole or not , white people had more in common with white people and Black people had more in common with Black people ,” Vappie told VOA .
Saloy believes Creole is firmly connected to African culture and should stay that way .