Bajan Creole

Bajan
Native to	Barbados
Native speakers	unknown (260,000 cited 1999)
Language family	English Creole Atlantic Eastern Southern Bajan
Language codes
ISO 639-3	bjs
Glottolog	baja1265
Linguasphere	52-ABB-ar

Bajan (/ˈbeɪdʒən/) is an English-based creole language spoken on the Caribbean island of Barbados. In general, the people of Barbados speak standard English on TV and radio, in courthouses, in government, and in day-to-day business, while Bajan creole is reserved for less formal situations, in music, or in social commentary.

Like many other English-based Caribbean creole languages, Bajan consists of a West African substrate and an English superstrate. Bajan is similar but distinguishable from the creoles of neighbouring Caribbean islands, as many of the other Caribbean creoles are theorized to have Hiberno-English or Scottish English as their superstrate variety, for example Jamaican Patois.

Language

Bajan is the Caribbean creole with grammar that most resembles Standard English. There is academic debate on whether its creole features are due to an earlier pidgin state or to some other reason, such as contact with neighboring English-based creole languages. In one historical model, Bajan arose when captive West Africans were forcibly transported to the island, enslaved and forced to speak English, though learned imperfectly. Bajan later became a means of communicating without always being understood by the slave holders.

Due to emigration to the Province of Carolina, Bajan has influenced American English and the Gullah language spoken in the Carolinas. Regionally, Bajan has ties to Belizean and Guyanese Creoles.

Unlike Jamaica, Guyana or Trinidad, Barbados was the destination of few enslaved African-born captives after 1800. Thus, African Barbadians became "Bajanized" relatively early on in the island's history. This tended to make them less resistant to local culture, with its Anglicised language, religion and customs.

As of 2014, Bajan is a more popular regional term for nationals of Barbados, in addition to the official name, Barbadian. In general, the people of Barbados speak standard British English on TV and radio, in courthouses, in government, and in day-to-day business, while Bajan is reserved for less formal situations, in music, or in social commentary. Standard English is a secondary native tongue of most Barbadians, and is usually used when talking formally. Barbadians may opt to speak Bajan amongst themselves or when in a very relaxed setting. Bajan is a primarily spoken language with no standardised written form. Due to the lack of standardisation, spelling may vary widely from person to person. There is much dialectal variation throughout the island. Barbadians practicing Rastafari on the island also tend to speak more with a Jamaican accent than full Bajan. Bajan words and sentences presented below are largely spelled as they are pronounced. New terminology, expressions, jargon, and idioms are regularly added to the dialect by social commentary sung during the annual Crop Over festival.

Features

As in most English-based Caribbean creoles, the interdentals /θ/ and /ð/ have merged with other consonants (in this case, /t/ and /d/, respectively). Unlike most other Caribbean creoles, Bajan is rhotic. Bajan has a strong tendency to realize word-final /t/ as a glottal stop [ʔ]. Thus the Bajan pronunciation of start, [stɑːɹʔ], contrasts sharply with the pronunciation of other Caribbean speakers, [staːt] or [stɑːt] or [staːɹt].

The word for you (plural) is wuna, similar to Jamaican unnu / unna or Bahamian yinna. Unlike Standard English, Bajan tends towards using a zero copula.

Questions are usually pronounced as a statement with a raised intonation; usually on the last word; to indicate that it is a question e.g. Wunna win de cricket? means "Did you (pl.) win the cricket match?"; dahs yours? means "Is that yours?"

Habitual actions are usually indicated by the word does and done, for example I does guh church punna Sunduh means "I go to church on Sundays", or I went church Sunduh "I went to church on Sunday". It is quite common for this to be shortened to I's guh church pun ah Sunduh.

Verbs in Bajan are not conjugated for tense, which is inferred from time words e.g. I eat all de food yestuhday = "I ate all of the food yesterday", where the word yesterday indicates that the action happened in the past.

The word gine is usually used to mark the future tense e.g. I gine eat = "I am going to eat".

Ain't (frequently shortened to ain') is used as a negative marker e.g. "I didn't do that" becomes I ain' do dat/dah. It is not uncommon for the I and the ain' to be pronounced in Bajan as "Ah'n" i.e. "Ah'n do dah" or "Ah'n able".

Proverbs

Bajan is peppered with a number of colourful proverbs and sayings that have been passed down through the generations. These are just a few examples below:

Proverbs	Meaning
De higha de monkey climb, de more he show he tail	The more you show off the more you show your faults.
Gol' (gold) teet (teeth) doan suit hog mout (mouth)	Fancy things don't suit those that aren't accustomed to them.
Cat luck ain' dog luck	What one person may get away with may cause problems for another.
Wuh ain' see you, ain' pass you	Just because you got away with something so far does not mean that it won't catch up with you later.
Ef greedy wait hot wud (would) cool	Patience will be rewarded.

African words in Bajan

wunna

You all from the Igbo word unu, which means You (plural).

obeah

From Igbo Obia, 'doctoring, mysticism, or oracle'.

Bim

From Igbo bé mụ́, 'my place, people, kindred', common nickname for Barbados

deh

From Igbo dị̀, 'present in'

eye-water

calque from ányá mmírí (eye + water), tears

duppy

From Twi Adope.

Cou-Cou

Part of the local national dish, but comes from "Fou Fou" in Africa.

nyam

(Pronounced "ng-yam" or "yamm") Means to eat ravenously or greedily, as in "Don't yamm the food like that boy!" – In Manjaku (language spoken in Guinea-Bissau) and in Pulaarit it means to chew (pronounced "nyam"); it also means chew in Luo (language spoken in East Africa).

jook

From the Fula word jukka 'poke, spur'

Further reading

• Blake, Renee A. 1997. "All o’ we is one? Race, class and language in a Barbados community". Ph.D., Stanford University.
• Burrowes, Audrey (in collaboration with Richard Allsopp), 1983. "Barbadian Creole: A note on its social history and structure". In Lawrence Carrington, Dennis Craig, & Ramon Todd Dandaré, eds, Studies in Caribbean Language. St. Augustine, Trinidad: Society for Caribbean Linguistics, 38-45.
• Fields, Linda. 1995. "Early Bajan: Creole or non-Creole?" In Jacques Arends, ed., The Early Stages of Creolization. Amsterdam, Philadelphia: Benjamins, 89-112.
• Holm, John A. 1988. Pidgins and Creoles, vol. II: Reference Survey. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
• Rickford, John R. 1992. "The Creole residue in Barbados". In Nick Doane, Joan Hall, & Dick Ringler, eds. Old English and New: Essays in language and linguistics in honor of Frederic G. Cassidy. NY: Garland, 183-201.
• Rickford, John R. & Renee Blake. 1990. "Copula contraction and absence in Barbadian Creole English, Samaná English and Vernacular Black English". In Kira Hall et al., eds. Proceedings of the 16th Annual Meeting of the Berkeley Linguistics Society. Berkeley CA: Berkeley Linguistics Society, 257-68.
• Rickford, John R and Jerome S. Handler. 1994. "Textual evidence on the nature of early Barbadian speech, 1676–1835". Journal of Pidgin and Creole Languages 9: 221-55.
• Roberts, Peter A. 1988. West Indians and their language. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. (written by a Bajan)
• Winford, Donald. 2000. "‘Intermediate’ Creoles and degrees of change in Creole formation: The case of Bajan". In I. Neumann-Holzschuh and E. W. Schneider, eds, Degrees of Restructuring in Creole Languages. Amsterdam, Philadelphia: Benjamins, 215-245.
• A~Z of Barbados Heritage, by Sean Carrington, Macmillan Caribbean – Macmillan Publishers Limited Press, 2007, paperback. ISBN 0-333-92068-6
• Notes for: A Glossary of Words and Phrases of Barbadian Dialect, by Frank A. Collymore, Second Edition – Advocate Co. Limited Press, 1957, paperback
• "From Bajan To Standard English", by Jerome Davis
• "Barbadian Dialect Poetry", by Kathleen Catford

See also

• Queen's English
• British English
• English in Barbados
• Gullah language
• English-based creole languages
• Barbadian culture
• Music of Barbados

External links

• Caribbean Poetry-Barbados
• African Influences on Barbados, Trevor Marshall
• http://www.barbadosdialect.page.tl : Introduces the book "From Bajan To Standard English". Highlights Bajan Dialect. See 50 common Bajan expressions
• Reflections of Barbados (A RADIO PROGRAMME - AUDIO ONLY), The Barbados Government Information Service