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Concept information

Preferred term

jamJamaican Patois  

Type

  • Language

Definition

  • Jamaican Patois, known locally as Patois (Patwa) or Jamaican, and called Jamaican Creole by linguists, is an English-lexified creole language with West African influences spoken primarily in Jamaica and the Jamaican diaspora. It is not to be confused with Jamaican English nor with the Rastafarian use of English. The language developed in the 17th century, when slaves from West and Central Africa were exposed to, learned and nativized the vernacular and dialectal forms of English spoken by their masters: British English, Scots and Hiberno English. Jamaican Patois features a creole continuum (or a linguistic continuum) —meaning that the variety of the language closest to the lexifier language (the acrolect) cannot be distinguished systematically from intermediate varieties (collectively referred to as the mesolect) nor even from the most divergent rural varieties (collectively referred to as the basilect). Jamaicans themselves usually refer to their dialect as patois, a French term without a precise linguistic definition.

Entry terms

  • Creole English, Jamaican
  • Jamaican Creole English

ISO 639-3 code

  • jam

Notation

  • jam

In other languages

  • Créole jamaïcain

    French

  • Jamaikanisch-Kreolische Sprache

    German

  • Creolo giamaicano

    Italian

  • Portuguese

  • Patois jamaiquino

    Spanish

URI

http://lexvo.org/id/iso639-3/jam

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