I don’t remember exactly when I first became aware of my “country” accent, but I recall the gentle teasing from my colleagues in 2001 when I moved to Montego Bay from the sugar cane belt in Petersfield, Westmoreland.
My pronunciations aptly fit the bill of what some Jamaicans like to call “chat bad”, but they were particularly tickled by the way my language and accent would instantly change whenever I answered the phone professionally. I can’t blame them. It’s actually a common view in Jamaica (mistakenly so) that people who “chat bad”, aka speak in patois, for the most part lack fluency in standard English.
Like many Jamaicans, I was taught that speaking patois was not only was a bad thing, but that doing so was strictly the domain of the poorly educated and the lowest social class. For a while, I believed it. Until about 2002, when on a trip to New York – the city of immigrants – I noticed that almost everyone around me was speaking in a different language. Slowly, I began to realize just how much language can bind people of similar cultures together, especially when far away from one’s homeland. I was fascinated and a little ashamed at the same time.
Overtime, I developed an appreciation for patois but that would soon be tested. In 2003, shortly after I enrolled my son in the first grade at a private prep school, the administration proposed a $10 fine each time the students spoke in patois. I watched silently as almost all the other parents agreed that this outrageous plan was somehow going to magically scare the chat bad nature out of their kids. When I couldn’t take it anymore, I raised my hand and spoke up. I said that while I appreciated the intent behind the fine, it was – in principle – a punishment for doing something that was an inherent part of Jamaican culture. Furthermore, I was very uncomfortable with the message being taught to my child that he should essentially be punished for speaking the language of his culture and, I added, could never lend my support to such a proposal. Their plan died that day.
A few years later, I would have a tinge of regret that I hadn’t insisted more on English speaking at home. My son seemed incapable of communicating anything in standard English. I tried my best to explain to him what had been drilled into my head for decades. “You can’t get anywhere without speaking English. It’s stupid system, but it’s the system that exists and you have to work with it or you won’t be successful.”
He got 11/12 in the Communication Task section of the GSAT (Grade Six Achievement Test) and graduated with the highest marks in his school overall. He gave me the news with a smug look on his face. I haven’t worried about his academics since.
These days, I’m having a different struggle with patois – I don’t get to speak it enough. Now in my fourth year of living abroad, I’ve come to realize that along with food and music, patois is one of the essential pillars of Jamaican culture. Nothing reinforces my Jamaican-ness more than when I’m having a full-on patois conversation on foreign soil. There’s an indescribable feeling that bathes the entire body in sunshine when you’re in a foreign country and hear the sweet sound of Jamaican patois. In fact, patois is the litmus test I use when I meet other Jamaicans abroad. I’m coming at you with my deepest Westmoreland country accent and if the response is anything other than patois, then sorry but Bye Felicia!
For too long, Jamaicans have been conditioned to self-hate while embracing the language, hair styles, and even skin colour of our former colonial masters. Anyone who closely examines the attitudes behind the rejection of patois, will see that there is something inherently wrong when the same people who are quite comfortable singing along to Grammy-winning dancehall songs want to limit the use of patois in the public domain. The colonial retention in Jamaica stinks when the whole world celebrates Bob Marley but we at home look down on the Rastafarian community. And it really is a disgrace when a global legend like Usain Bolt is still too black for some Jamaicans.
It took a long time for me to get over the remnants of colonialism that taught me that the language my ancestors used to confuse their cruel masters was a symbol of pride and not shame. I’m proud of my patois and my ‘country’ accent, I know that my locks proudly represent black resistance and was not a dirty hairstyle, and that my black skin is, what Chronixx said they never told us, beautiful.