CARIMAC Times 2016: The JREAM Edition Journalists Reviving Awareness of what Matters | Page 123

Russell said, as a result, he prefers to speak Patois
when he is with his friends in his community or
while communicating in the streets of Jamaica.
But his reasons are mixed.
“When with your friends, it’s easier to rap that
way and some of them are from inner cities,
so they won’t really get the English. When
you’re on the road now, you have to use patois
sometimes to give off a sense of aggressiveness
so you won’t become a target of violence …”
He shared how his community tends to react
to a man using the English Language: “People
in my community react normal to when you
speak patois, but when you speak English, they
give off a different vibe. They’ll start teasing a
little or copy[ing] …”
Russell said speaking in English can even result
in a male’s sexuality being questioned.
“When you’re in certain situations, speaking
English will make you seem like a homosexual,
so people would divert to Patois to fit in or to
remove that branding …”
I asked Professor Cooper to what extent she
would she agree with there being a correlation
between speaking English and being perceived
as homosexual.
“That one is a real difficult one to pin down. We
have to think through that one a little bit more
carefully. I don’t think it’s just English words
that are associated with homosexuality …”
However she conceded that the notion of
there being a perception of men who speak

in English as being homosexual cannot be
rejected entirely.
“In the [ Jamaican] culture, there is definitely
an anxiety around homosexuality, particularly
around men, and so anything in the language
that signifies homosexuality would be rejected …”
This anxiety, Professor Cooper explained, has
influenced a kind of creativity among males of
varying ages in which words that immediately
suggest a relationship to other men are ‘recreated’
to prevent any possibility of being considered
to be anything but heterosexual.
She noted the example of Mandeville, the capital
of Manchester, a mid-southern parish in Jamaica
which has been transformed into ‘Gyaldev ille’.
The former suggested it has a concentration of
men, thus making it an unacceptable location
to visit. Those “who can’t go to Mandeville …
go to Gyaldeville.”
Dr. Moji Anderson, lecturer on anthropology
and researcher at the Mona Campus of the UWI,
sought to explain this practice in her article,
‘Straighten Up Yu Argument’ — Language as
shibboleth of Jamaican Masculinity.
She said the results of semi-structured interviews
with Jamaican males show how language use
forms part of shibboleths, which are cultural
practices that maintain boundaries between
groups, in this case heterosexual and homosexual
men.
“The shibboleth was maintained through lexical
expansion: the avoidance, modification and
replacement of certain words. Just as not using the
shibboleth meant “you are not masculine enough”

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