Jamaican Creole (Patois)

1. Jamaican Creole (Patois)

2. Pidgins and Creoles English-Based Pidgins and Creoles - Hawaiian Creole - Gullah or Sea Islands Creole (spoken on the islands off the coasts of northern Florida, Georgian and South Carolina) - Jamaican Creole - Krio (spoken in Sierra Leone) - Sranan and Djuka (spoken is Suriname) - Cameroon Pidgin English - TokPisin

3. Decreolization • Shift toward standard form of the language from which the creole derives. • The standard language has the status of social prestige, education, wealth. Creole speakers find themselves under great pressure to change their speech in the direction of the standard.

4. Hypercreolization • Aggressive reaction against the standard language on the part of creole speakers, who assert the superior status of their creole, and the need to recognize the ethnic identity of their communication. Such a reaction can lead to a marked change in speech habits as speakers focus on what they see as the “pure” form of the creole.

5. Recreolization • The opposite of decreolisation is a process whereby the repaired Creole varieties start to become more, rather than less, creolelike. • Black adolescents in Britain, whose parents had immigrated from various parts of the Caribbean spoke the local English dialect of their area, and a form of creole which had undergone decreolisation in their parents’ generation. • However, an increase in creole constructions occurs among adolescents recreolisation. This phenomenon has been noted in several parts of England. Life in England has not brought the social mobility (or the decreolisation) that the original immigrants might have expected for their children. • Some young British African Caribbeans create London Jamaican English forms that are clearly different from Jamaican Jamaican English (JJE) forms, e.g., fru for through (JJE tru). For these youngsters this type of creole has covert prestige with its images of solidarity, Black Britishness, and distinctiveness from other varieties of English: it is deliberately, oppositionally, and nonlegitimately different. London Jamaican is ‘a sign of ethnic identity and solidarity, and [provided] an in-group language for adolescents.’)

6. Patois (Jamaican Creole) • Sample text. Do you know what it is about? • Di habrij Jumiekan di taak wa dehn taak dehn kaali patwa, dehn kaali kriol, ar iivn bad hInglish, askaadn tu ou dehn fiil proud ar kaanful. Jumiekan dem uona hatitiuud divaid uoba di langwij di huol a dem taak di muos, likl muos aal di taim. Alduo hInglish a di hofishal langwij a di konchri, ahn dehn aal ab wa dehn kaal Jumiekan hInglish, a muosli bakra ahn tapanaaris yu hie widi iina hofishal serkl, anles smadi waahn himpres wid piiki-puoki. Kaman yuusij rienj frahn Jumiekan hInglish to braad patwa wid bout chrii digrii a separieshan, aafn iina di wan piika siem wan kanvasieshan. • Translation • The speech of the average Jamaican is variously described as a patois or creole, or even as bad English, depending on the degree of pride or disdain of the describer. Jamaicans' attitudes themselves are very divided over the language they all speak most, if not all, of the time. Although English is the official language of the country, and a variant known as Jamaican English is acknowledged, it is mostly heard only in formal situations, unless one wants to impress with "speaky-spoky." Common usage ranges from Jamaican English to broad patois with about three degrees of separation, often within a single speaker's conversation.

7. Jamaican Patois/Creole • Spoken primarily in Jamaica and Jamaican diaspora. • Not to be confused with Jamaican English and Rastafarian use of English • Mainly spoken language • Discriminated as a sign of lack of education and intelligence • September 2002  establishment of The Jamaican Language Unit (JLU), a Unit in the Department of Language, Linguistics and Philosophy, UWI, Mona

8. Jamaican Language Unit • In May, 2001 the Parliament of Jamaica recognized the need to include within the charter freedom from discrimination on the grounds of language. • Many citizens of Jamaica lack competence in English, the language in which services of the state are normally provided. • The vast majority of such persons are speakers of Jamaican, widely referred to as Patwa. • It was argued that failure to provide services of the state in a language in such general use or discriminatory treatment by officers of the state based on the inability of a citizen to use English, was a violation of the rights of citizens so affected. • The proposal was made that freedom from discrimination on the ground of language be inserted into the Charter of Rights.

9. To support such a right, it was recommended that a language planning agency be set up to deal with issues such as: • a standard writing system for Jamaican, • the development of technical and administrative terminology in the language for use by officers of the state, • the monitoring of state agencies with respect to the non-discriminatory provision of services in the two languages in general use, i.e. English and Jamaican, • public education on the language issue.

10. I The language planning agency thus set up has the responsibility for: (a) formally proposing and popularising an official standard writing system for Jamaican, (b) the development of specialised Jamaican terminology in the areas covered in the public communications of the various state agencies, (c) developing styles of usage in Jamaican appropriate to public and formal functions, (d) developing standards of non-discriminatory language usage for public agencies, (e) running training programmes for public officers in relation to a-d, and (f) monitoring the level of performance by public agencies in the area of the provision of services in a manner which did not discriminate on the ground of language, (g) providing public education on the issue of language discrimination in Jamaica.

11. Frederic Cassidy, a Jamaican linguist, developed a method of presenting the Jamaican language in writing, in 1961.

12. Writing Jamaican the Jamaican Way (RaitinJamiekan Di JamiekanWie): a music video by a Jamaican artist GemSto:n (Nickesha T. Dawkins). It was commissioned by the Jamaican Language Unit. The lyrics are originally done by Miss. Dawkins with some modifications by Professor Hubert Devonish. The song speaks about the Cassidy-JLU system for writing Jamaican Creole and touches on issues of national identity via language. It advocates for the use of Jamaican Creole alongside Standard Jamaican English in Schools etc and urges Jamaicans to be proud of their mother tongue by eradicating the negative stereotypes that they themselves have placed on the use of what is for most Jamaicans their first language.

13. How to speak Jamaican • Writing Jamaican the Jamaican Way • David Crystal