I come from a very patriotic Jamaican family. We take pride in everything. From our food to our music, to our dances, to the language we speak: Jamaican Patois. This is the language I heard while I was in the womb, while I took my first steps, while I was getting my hair plaited to go to bed, while I was doing homework. It’s engraved in my blood. There are different variations of the dialect, all depending on the region where they reside. One big contrast that splits the dialect into two is the difference between uptown Jamaican Patois and country Jamaican Patois. I believe uptown is similar to Standard British English and the country one is tied more to the other languages that make up Patois. However, as brilliant as I am, I do not know these other languages. I do know that some of them are African languages due to the Transatlantic slave trade in the 16th century and so forth. The Spanish language is also tied into patois because before Jamaica was under British rule, it was under the Spanish. There may or may not be some Chinese, Indian, and other Asian influence on the language due to indentured servants being on the island under British rule as well. What I want to know about the dialect is why is it considered wrong compared to Standard British English? Why is uptown patois more acceptable than country? How does it affect the people of Jamaica as a society?
To start my research process, I first Interviewed my mom, Kimberly Baker. Although she was born in The Bahamas, she grew up in Jamaica from a very young age. I first asked her “Where in Jamaica did you live?” to which she replied, “I lived in Spur Tree which is in Manchester, a parish of Jamaica.” I then asked her a few more questions to describe Spur Tree. She grew up on a farm with lots of land, animals, fruits, and vegetables. She went to school there for basic and secondary school. However, for “high school”, she attended a school in Halfway Tree, which is in downtown Kingston. I then asked her if there was a clear difference between Spur Tree and Halfway Tree, she stated, “Oh definitely. For one, in Spur Tree, country, I had to walk to school. Uptown, you take the bus. Two, everyone knows West Indian schools are militant, right? However, it was worse in Halfway Tree… I got beat in both schools for ‘chatting bad’ but in high school, it was worse. Cyan chat inna patwah at alllll.” Right here she explains how her teachers would give her “licks”, a patois word for beating. In school, it was usually done with a ruler or just by hand. “Chatting bad” is talking in Jamaican patois to a full extent. Seeing this huge contrast, I asked my mother if she ever code switched, to which she replied, “Yes, all the time. I know I code switch here (USA) a lot but yes even in Jamaica. It was mostly at school or professional settings and even sometimes when I go uptown. I would switch from my patois to theirs or just proper English— weh yuh call it again? Standard British English… They usually can tell I’m from country though because of my accent.” My mom would switch her way of speaking just to be more socially acceptable, even though she was just in a different town. Settling in with this new information, I ran a poll on Twitter asking “Which version of Jamaican patois do you believe mirrors Standard British English more?” with two choices: Uptown or Country. With only five votes, four voted for Uptown while the other voted country. Considering that the island was under British rule for so long, Jamaica finds uptown patois to be more socially acceptable.
So what other languages make up the majority of patois? After an extensive and thorough search for Jamaican history books, I, unfortunately, did not find any that stated which countries in Africa the slaves came from. However, I did find a website made by a History 300 class from the University of Miami about Slave Resistance in the Caribbean. Within the website, I found an essay titled “Maroon Culture and How it Came About”, written by Leanna Prendergast. In this essay, she states, “Jamaican planters used the term Koromanti was to refer to slaves purchased from the Akan region of West Africa, presently known as Ghana… But the Koromantis, who came from a natural environment very similar to that of Jamaica, were also able to rebel against slavery and run to the mountains of St. Ann, Clarendon, and St. Elizabeth, the original homes of the Jamaican Maroons.” This showcases one of the African countries Jamaican slaves descended from. This also shows that the reason why country patois is more closely related to the African origins of it. It is because of the high populations of slaves that inhabited the areas and made it their own instead of obeying the British and their rules. Furthermore, I found a tweet written by @ashindestad which states, “I feel like what he said is true for all the islands… Patois is special to us as Jamaican people because it is the language we used to organise and revolt – just like the Haitian people” This ties into the idea of why uptown patois or standard British English is more favored in professional settings and education. It all goes back into the history of the island being under British rule with the subordination of African languages. British slaveowners enforced English upon the slaves and continued to do so throughout the years, trying to diminish any other language so slaves could not escape.
Because I started to find useful information, I continued to browse on Twitter and stumbled across a tweet by @chesterjonesjnr, which says, “#jamaicanlaws speaks more english than patois = uptown. speaks more patois than English = ghetto” Similar to what my poll indicated, this tweet supports how Jamaican society has the idea that patois is not acceptable, ghetto being derogatory. Even though the tweeter may not believe they are enforcing the idea of an ideal language, they are. It’s the same belief the British wanted the people of Jamaica to have. Shortly after, I found another tweet by @laurenless_ which said, “AND THATS ON UPTOWN JAMAICA” while replying to a tweet by @NewMacedonFlow that said “Disassociating your children from black culture isn’t ‘giving them a better life’” To elaborate, @laurenless, is insinuating that uptown Jamaica promotes the erasure of black culture which connects to why they don’t accept country patois and why other Jamaicans feel like uptown patois mirrors Standard British English. In the book, “The Jamaica Reader: History, Culture, Politics.”, editors, Diana Paton and Mattew Smith, state, “Only in 1509 did substantial numbers of Spanish settlers arrive in Jamaica. They came under the command of Juan de Esquivel, acting on the orders of Christopher Columbus’s son, Diego, who had just inherited his father’s titles, including nominal control of Jamaica.” This quote serves to acknowledge the fact that the Spanish did have control of Jamaica before losing it to the British so the patois language does have Spanish influences on it. This plays a huge role in the glorification of uptown patois because it does not have a huge impact from the Spanish language like country patois does.
All of these sources brought me to the conclusion that Uptown patois definitely takes more of British English than any other language that makes up the dialect, resulting in language subordination for country patois. Language subordination is when one language or language variety gains hegemonic powers over another. The attempt of stripping this beautiful dialect can start from as early as 5 years old in school. It’s enforced in education, work, and maybe even at a supermarket. This research reaffirmed what I thought and also brought me to new conclusions. I learned that Jamaica does have slight racism within the island although it’s not as big as America’s. I also learned that patois was used to organize and set up escape plans by slaves just like African American Vernacular English and Haitian Creole. However, I am not satisfied with this research. Even though I didn’t find anything on it, I still believe there is an Asian influence on the language of Jamaica. I also want to know which African languages primarily make up patois. It’s only because Jamaica is such a small island that has little research on it that I can’t find everything that I want to know overseas. That and the eBooks I found online were a dollar too many. In conclusion, this research gave me a new perspective on patois. It gave me a new sense of pride, stronger than the one I had before and it also made me more connected to my families’ origins and mine.
Windett, Kasia. “Interview With Kimberly Baker”. 2021
The Jamaica Reader: History, Culture, Politics. The United Kingdom, Duke University Press, 2021.
@chesterjonesjnr. Twitter. 2015
@laurenless_. Twitter. 2020
@ashindestad. Twitter. 2021
Premdergast, Leanna. “Maroon Culture and How It Came About .” The Maroons, https://scholar.library.miami.edu/slaves/Maroons/maroons.html.
Windett, Kasia. “Which version of Jamaican patois do you believe mirrors Standard British English more?”
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