The Caribbean nation could make Patois its official language, after it parts company with King Charles.
Walk into any government office, courtroom or classroom in Jamaica, and you’ll be expected to speak the official language, English.Di Jamiekan Nyuu Testiment
Now, as Jamaica moves ahead with plans to cut ties to the British monarchy – a shift that would remove King Charles as its head of state and make the Commonwealth’s largest country in the Caribbean into a republic – momentum is building to make Patois Jamaica’s official language, on par with English.
A big shift in language policy in Jamaica, which has about 2.8 million people and is the third-largest Anglophone country in the Americas, after the US and Canada, would resonate across the Caribbean and parts of Central and South America. That lingering sway is coming under renewed criticism in Jamaica, where more than 90 per cent of the population is black. Memories endure of centuries of a slavery-based economy marked repeatedly by bloody revolts – especially after UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunakfor Britain’s role in the slave trade or commit to paying reparations.
“We are teaching children to read in a foreign language,” says Grace Coston, who recently stepped down as principal of one of Jamaica’s top public secondary schools.
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