I've recently started trying to learn the language of Jamaica, but I haven't able to find resources or someone to practice with. I'd love to be able to find someone who would teach me or help me. Even just some links to things where I could learn would be amazing!

Just curious about the formal differences between those four classifications. Thanks!

Dear r/Jamaica,

I am currently examining the stigmatization of Patois and possibly newly evolving attitudes towards it for a linguistic project at my university. My fellow students and me would love to get some first-hand insight on this topic in the form of a short interview with a patois-speaking person via Zoom, Skype etc or even just via chat.

Please feel free to message me if you are interested in participating and spreading some light on this subject matter :)

Its second nature and to my ear sounds like english... find it strange when people cant understand it.

Hello All!

So I have been dating this man for a few months now and I’ve been meeting his family. I LOVE how hospitable everyone is but I feel awful because... well... they’re Jamaican and I cannot understand patois. His neighborhood is heavily Jamaican as well, and I’m a mixed race person, so people automatically assume I’m half Jamaican when I’m just out and about. I cannot understand patois for the life of me. Despite a life long love for the culture, country, and music, I just can’t seem to understand it. I’ve even BEEN to Jamaica like 10 times in my life and I still had such issues communicating.

I’m hoping to find some resources or tips for picking it up. I’m not necessarily trying to speak it, I just want to understand and not make people uncomfortable in their community. And I feel especially bad asking his grandma to repeat things for me.

I apologize if this was the wrong subreddit, if you could point me in the right direction, that would be great too!

Thank you so much!

The lyrics of the song began by translating phrases from Jamaican to English and then sang that Jamaican is a language not a patois by example of English words that come from other languages such as German or Italian (propaganda and umbrella ie)

thanks :)

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So i heard that London roadman slang is descended from Patois, but how similar or different are they now? Just wondering

It seems there's a certain level of mutual intelligibility, but at the same time many English speakers find it nearly impossible to understand patois.

What would be the general consensus on it?

Not sure if this is the place to ask, but I'm trying to do a project on Jamaican patois. Does anyone here know how to do the IPA for common Jamaican word translations? I know patois is primarily an oral language, but many people use phonetic pronunciations when doing patois in written form. I'd like to be able to use IPA to demonstrate pronunciation of a bunch of words.

Hi! I'm a researcher looking at different creoles. I just wanted to check a translation.

How do you say "fight" in Patois? The book I have says "cuss-cuss". Is that right?

Thank you!

https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Choc_des_patois

Hey guys, about to crash but figured i'd post this now and checkup on it later. I've moved to a different part of the UK with a sizeable Jamaican population, i've got a few friends who are British-Jamaican that speak half-patois with me but go fully into it when they're talking with each other or people around town.

I can get by right now simply because a lot of our "roadman slang" is based off of patois (wahgwan, wah yah seh, bless up, ya dun know, etc) but i'd like to gain a better understanding of how it all works and ideally i'd like to be able to speak to these people in the way they're most comfortable since there's always this awkward moment where they realise i didn't understand them and they switch to standard English.

I know i'll pick it up over time, but i've been here for a bit and it's always a bit embarrassing having to ask for them to explain something to me and forcing them to swap over to speaking in a way that they're less comfortable with, like the town i live in is fairly well known for it's Jamaican population, they have a carnival to celebrate yearly, etc and i'd like to get to a stage where they can just go about their lives as normal and i fit in.

I've definitely found if i can keep the rhythym of the conversation going people here get energetic and it's great but if i have to ask them to explain something more than once or twice the mood suddenly changes as they recognise i'm not really part of their community yet.

So has anyone found any resources for learning Patois online that has helped them? My mates are talking me through it because i 100% need to hear it to be able to get it but any additional resources would be amazing.

Thanks for reading.

for some drum and bass mixes, I need any kind of Reggae sound boy chatter. Any suggestions? Most of my Reggae records are either from the Rocksteady era, or the kind of cuts Deejays would spin while they said the stuff I'm looking for.

I believe it was a Castle Super Beast episode from around six months+ ago

I was reading up on Jamaican musical genres, and I came across a song “(Under Me) Sleng Teng” by Wayne Smith 1985. It’s a ground-breaking song because it was one of the first to use a digital track as a riddim (similar to a “beat” in hip hop).

The riddim became known as “Sleng Teng” and is extremely popular in ragga and dancehall.

My question is whence did the term come? Did Wayne Smith just make it up, or is there some obvious meaning that I’m just overlooking (like how “riddim” comes from “rhythm”).

Hey,

I am from the UK. My mum is Jamaican and so am I however, in order to assimilate to English culture my grandparents would not let my mum speak patois.

I feel like I am having an identity crisis, being black but only speaking standard English. I would like to learn the language in hopes of being able to connect to my culture. Does anyone have any resources to do so? My family is really small and none of them speak it :(? Books, courses, musical artists [except the obvious ofc bob marley, popcaan, vybz kartel lol]?

Do you think it is worth learning it?

Thank you.

So, I'm watching Lovers Rock, an episode from the BBC series Small Axe. The dialect is fantastic, lyrical patois, and I'm joining in, talking to my partner in a poor mimic of it. We do this often with other shows such as The Crown (posh upper class) and This is England (Sheffield working class). I don't feel like I'm being mean, we're just enjoying trying out different accents and dialects, playing with the phrases and sounds. That said I'm aware that this behaviour could be seen as racist in specific contexts.

Is it ok?

Hello there!

Short:

I got really into Rastafarian culture several years ago and I'd like to make sub videos like this: https://youtu.be/HiNFBn0si_4 to spread the message around the world. I'm a native Spanish speaker and an advanced Chinese user. I speak English but I can't 100% catch the lyrics of some songs since some of them got a few words in Patois. I'd like to ask for help in order to get the lyrics 100% right and help others to fully understand the lyrics of some songs which lyrics cannot be found online.

Long:

My life changed from hell to heaven since I started reading in between the lines of Reggae songs. It opened my eyes in a painful but enlightening and blissful way. Knowing and accepting the truth and reality about Babylon, which it's real and not just a metaphor was a process that took me years.

When I was young I thought that Reggae music was only about "Ganjah". Now it got me into anthropology, history, politics, philosophy, spirituality, positivity, linguistics, and even a science career. It's been my strength during depressing and uncertain times. I'm not a religious person at all, yet I adopted Rastafarian philosophy and Jah into my life which fits better to me.

It basically saved my life and feel the duty to help others who might not understand Patois or even English to understand the message.

I live in Asia and no one knows here about Rastafarianism and if they do, they only know what Babylon wants them to know So I want to sub the lyrics in Chinese. After living years in here, I haven't met anyone who even knows who BOB MARLEY was.

I'm from Latin America and many people who don't understand English would definitely love to understand and have the real message in Spanish as well, I'd love to make the subtitles in Spanish as well. (Latin Reggae or "Ska" is way too shallow in comparison with the serious topics that Reggae embraces).

What to do?

This would be an example of what I can't understand: https://youtu.be/L5Qoac1Ppuk

I don't mean in any way to monetise or earn any income with this so if you'd feel like volunteering to help me and provide me with the lyrics of some songs I want to translate from time to time I'd totally appreciate it.

I'd type the lyrics I could understand and if you could help me to complete the rest I'd miss due to my lack of ability to understand, would be great.
I'll do the video and respective translations