Haoles and Friends

[Derrick Barnicoat]

A dialect is not the same as "broken english" and as I see it it is always respectful to be as genuine as possible. Trying to learn pidgin and speak it fluently with the locals is a bit phony. IMHO it is better to be natural and speak how you speak maybe pick up a few phrases here and there from close friends or whatever but trying to speak full on pidgin if you are not a part of that culture is just a bit poser ish. BTW jamaicans who speak patois are not thrilled to hear outsiders trying to speak patois. Jamaican patois was developed so that the bourgeoisie class would not be able to understand their conversations. The jamaican accent is different and most jamaicans only have an accent because they are from a british colony and learned british english in school. Most jamaicans don't even speak patois it is basically rastas, anti-establishment folks and street culture folks that use patois.