Features of Caribbean English Creole Grammar

[0:00]The Caribbean English Creole is a nuanced language of its own. Just like English, it has its own set of rules and creative elements which makes it interesting. In the Caribbean, we use so many creative word for expressing how we feel. In Jamaica, we call cheating bun, but did you know in Guyana, it's called blow, and in Trinidad, it's called horn? The more I study languages, the more I appreciate my own and others around me. Even though Caribbean countries may use different words at times, Caribbean Creole has a common structure regardless of which Caribbean island you're on. So, for the most part, that is why Caribbean people are able to understand Creole whether it is Trinidadian Creole, Guyanese Creole, or simply whichever Caribbean country you're from. Let's take these two sayings for example. In Trinidad, they say, cockroach have no right in fowl party. While in Jamaica, they say, cockroach nuh business innah fowl fight. In both cases, we mean mind your business. See, both sentences look and sound fairly similar, and that's all due to the grammatical features of Caribbean English Creole. Let's look into each. First, let's talk about zero copula. In zero copula, we omit auxiliary or helping verbs from sentences. When I say auxiliary verbs, I mean words like is, are, was, were, have. Look at this example. Some a dem big. If we translate this sentence to standard Caribbean English, we would have some of them are big. See, the helping verb are should be between them and big. But by using zero copula, we take it out completely.

[1:58]Next, unmarked count. We use the singular version of nouns to indicate their plural. Let's put this into context. A Jamaican who has never tasted a mango before may ask a friend, "Yuh like mango?" The friend may reply by saying, "Yea man! MANGO sweet!" Here, both friends are referring to mangoes in general, not a specific mango. But still, they use the singular mango instead of saying, "Do you like MANGOES?" Yes! Mangoes are sweet!

[2:40]Now let's look at unmarked action verbs with reference to the past tense. In Caribbean standard English, we use markers which indicate which tense we are using. However, in Caribbean Creole, these markers are sometimes omitted. Take this scenario for example. A child may be around the age four or five years, is in his room, you know, all good, unbothered, say playing video games, all right? His younger sister, about two years old, runs into his room, slaps him, and sprints out. He runs behind her crying. His older brother then asks, "Wah happen to yuh bredda?" To which he replies, "She lick mi!" No, being Caribbean, you know his brother going to say, "Aye yute! Fix up yuh argument!" He gets it of course, so still hollering, he says, "She SLAP mi!" See, lick and slap does not have the ED to mark the tense. But we know this happened before he reported his sister. In standard English, he would have meant, "She SLAPPED me!"

[4:00]Apart from taking out tense markers completely, we sometimes add pre-verbal markers to indicate tenses. For example, a mother asks, "Shirley, yuh do yuh homework yet?" Now there are many responses which Shirley could use. Mi bin/ben a do the homework, which means I have been doing the homework. Mi aguh do the homework, which means I am going to do the homework. Mi did do the homework, which means I already did the homework. Mi a do the homework, which means I am doing the homework right now.

[4:46]We often omit the voiceless 'th' sounds from words ending in 'th'. So, for example, a stranger offers someone a ride to which he reply or she replies, Mi nah guh nowhere wid yuh! This person said wid instead of with. The same is true for words such as fifth, where we often say fif instead of fifth.

[5:19]The use of double negatives. In the previous example, I said, Mi nah guh nowhere wid yuh! By saying nah, meaning not, and nowhere instead of anywhere, I would have added a double negative to the sentence. Another example could be, Mi nuh want nothing fi drink. No, and nothing again places a double negative in the sentence. And that's it for today's video. I hope you found this information helpful and informative. Don't forget to like and subscribe for more content like this. As usual, if you're hearing this, that means you've made it to the end of the video. Congratulations! My name is Camille by the way. Hey! thanks for watching and I'll see you in the next one.