What's your thought Historian...X,TDowl, Exile...

[HL]

...you too PR, Mosiah....

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-16285462

[Bricktop]

Now dem can trick di people inna patois too...

[Sir X]

Its all about literacy , if you cannot read english ,then how can you read patwa?

Its good for the literate who want to read a bible in thier cultural tongue, for the illiterate its makes no difference except the feel good factor because reading goes along with comprehension which gives us literacy.

Its a good thing in my view , those who choose to disregard it as keeping us illiterate are so far from the truth, when they have factored in the meaning of literacy.

That disregard is based on ignorance and self hate.

[Willi]

Reading that phonetic stuff gives me a headache.

Di Lenjel Gabriel? A whofah patois dat?
De Angel Gabriel is how I understand patois when written.

First we have to create a standard that makes sense!!!!!

English versions read along these lines: "And having come in, the angel said to her, 'Rejoice, highly favoured one, the Lord is with you: blessed are you among women.'"

"Now compare that with our translation of the Bible," says Mr Stewart.

"De angel go to Mary and say to 'er, me have news we going to make you well 'appy. God really, really, bless you and him a walk with you all de time."


AND

Di ienjel go tu Mieri an se tu ar se, 'Mieri, mi av nyuuz we a go mek yu wel api. Gad riili riili bles yu an im a waak wid yu all di taim."

[Exile]

As an academic project yes, but doubt and long-term or far reaching positive outcome...the validity of the original text is in question, isn't it....but the pseudo-intellectuals will have a field day with it especially those who espouse the Roman Pope, the white God and oppression of the people. The question is who benefits the most from this publication - the authors, publishers, or the people?

[Peter R]

Agree with your view on the book translation. I would buy the patois Bible.

With respect to teaching ENGLISH, the approach should be changed in JA schools... that is the approach should almost be an ESL one. They teach English as if the kids are already fluent and that is not the case.

Patois' place and oral tradition should be enhanced and validated in schools through drama, creative writing, etc.

[Sir X]

That is a good point peter but the english themselves dont speak english but english is the official language, e.g scouse, cockney to jinglish.

My view is ,its a literacy problem and publishing the book or books in patwa (patios) will not do a damm thing to increase or decrease our standard of literacy.

[Westman]

Jamiaca needs to forget about these damn distractions and make sure all of its kids can read, speak and comprehend English well. That is what matters most. If kids can do these things, they can learn or even teach themselves any other academic subject. All the BS about cockney and all that is BS. We need to prepare kids to do well in the workplace and compete in the global economy. The English are way ahead of us in those areas, regardless of how they got there. We need to get to that level and then we can decide whether we should be worrying about whether the Bible is in patois, cockney or in something else. So this is all somebody's academic exercise which should not be used to distract from the job #1 which is to ensure that the entire population is very proficient in reading, writing, comprehending and conducting business in English.

[Sickko]

I know my opinion want sought but for whats its worth, the words in the title looks nothing like the patois we write here or what i have seen anywhere else, for a start it looked to me like Afrikaans or some German.

This is the first problem we would have if Patois is to be an official written language

[Westman]

I had no idea you were so observant. We would end up with 1,000 or more versions of patois because very word is different and there are different forms of patois grammar. mek we jus stick with English for now. We our population is damn good at English, we can dally with the patois thing.

[Sickko]

Mrs Graham was a very good English teacher...when she managed to stay awake and stop drooling; Shae Brown was sexy as hell and I once had a dream that I woke up in bed with Ms Evans who taught me 10th grade English.

Yes i loved English classes because I was always ahead of the grade ever since I can recall, even in Primary school, nothing to brag about as for me it was a gift and some thing I try to nurture.

[Sir X]

You do realise you are agreeing with me , cockney and all, the issue is literacy which means comprehension of reading and writing.


That is an issue on this site comprehension...lol

[Sickko]

There are so many different variations of word, many people in South Manchester, St Elizabeth and St Ann who pronounce 'come' as 'khum' and here in St James we say Chooseday.

Diggy Henry told me a story that when he went to UWI there was a guy from St Mary whose accent was so thick many of them had no idea what he was saying, it was almost like he was not even speaking English- and since he got into university one cant really question his intelligence or understanding of the English language..

[Reggaedoc]

Agree Westman. This self-pity and cockney excuse are just excuses for our failure. We have less than 3M people, the entire English speaking world is several billions, so we should be proficient in a language that only 3M people can speak or understand?. Doesn't make any sense. Language is for communicating. It is not just a cultural artifact.

[Sir X]

Self pity & Cockney excuse , explain yourself man, you and west man ?

Literacy means being able to read the written and comprehend it ! It does not excuse those who should have grasp of both articles (reading & writing).The most critical piece (comprehension).

Cockney & Scouse slang and present day Jinglish was used as examples to show that even england the mother country has dialects that they have not enforced as a national linguistic form of communication.

So why should we do so with patios I asked reflectively ?we should embarce them culturally like they have done in the U.K , that I support.

Again we have a literacy problem, leave the cockney ,scouse and jinglish and examine my points carefully.

You need to explain yourself or why you see reasoned arguements as self pity and cockney excuse in my post.

I take offence to your literacy , comprehend...lol...

Literacy has traditionally been described as the ability to read for knowledge and write coherently and think critically about the written word.