Dread Talk: The Language of Rastafari - Softcover

Pollard PH.D., Dr Velma

Softcover

ISBN 10: 9768125683 ISBN 13: 9789768125682

Publisher: University of the West Indies Press, 2000

Synopsis

Pollard analyses the speech code of the Rastafari of Jamaica, a group that adjusted the languages of the Jamaican people to suit their religious, philosophical, social and economic concerns as people speaking from "under".

The book includes descriptions of Dread Talk, the speech of the Rastafari, as an example of lexical expansion in a creole language, and the influence of the lexicon on Jamaican English. It also discusses the adjustment of the language to other creoles, both English and French-related, in the Eastern Caribbean. New to this revised edition is a chapter on "Dread Talk in the Diaspora" that discusses the language as used in the urban centres of North America and Europe.

About this title

Review

"Dread Talk is one of the most dramatic examples of the imbrication of language, culture and society to be found anywhere, and no one has explored this topic with as much sensitivity, detail, and insight as Velma Pollard. I regard this book as required reading for sociolinguists and linguistic anthropologists, and I recommend it enthusiastically to scholars in social and cultural anthropology, sociology, comparative literature, lexicography, Caribbean Studies, and Africana/Black Studies." John R. Rickford, Martin Luther King, Jr., Centennial Professor of Linguistics and Director, African and Afro-American Studies, Stanford University.

Edition details

• Publisher: University of the West Indies Press
• Publication date: 2000
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 9768125683
• ISBN 13: 9789768125682
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 136