Trinidadian English
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Trinidadian English or Trinidad and Tobago Standard English is a dialect of English used in Trinidad and Tobago. English co-exists with both non-standard varieties of English as well as Creole varieties, primarily Trinidadian Creole English in Trinidad and Tobagonian Creole English in Tobago. Most speakers use Trinidadian or Tobagonian Creole in informal discourse but switch to the standard dialect of English (to varying degrees) in formal settings. Speakers of the standard variety also switch to the Creole dialect either for humour or to connect with "the common people."
As for all other varieties of English, Trinidadian English was originally based on a standard of British English. TE now uses many Americanisms including apartment, trunk (of a car) and truck, although flat is also used, and bonnet continues to be more commonly used than hood (of a car) (but lorry is not used). In addition, many words from the vernacular have found their way into standard English, including such words as to lime (to 'hang out' or 'to party'), fête (French) meaning 'to party', lagniappe (of Spanish origin from la ñapa) meaning 'a little something extra', and dougla (of Hindi origin), now meaning 'a person of both African and Indian parentage'.
The sound of Trinidadian English is often compared with that of South Wales and India.
[edit] See also
[edit] External links
- Miguel Browne's Trini Talk
- A Trinidadian accent
- Discussion of a paper by Lise Winer
- An Ethnolinguistic Study of the Trinidadian Creole community in Flatbush, Brooklyn by Keisha T. Lindsay and Justine Bolusi
- 50 Frequenty Asked Questions on Caribbean Language by the Society for Caribbean Linguistics
- Wiwords A cross-referencing dictionary of West Indian words with a large number of Trinidadian terms
- The Sociolinguistic Situation of Trinidad and Tobago.
- Phonological Hypercorrection in the Process of Decreolization--the Case of Trinidadian English.
[edit] References
- James, Winford, 2001, Trinidad and Tobago Standard English?.
- James, Winford, 2003, Doing our own thing with English I.
- James, Winford, 2003, Doing our own thing with English II.
- James, Winford, 2003, What kind of question is this?.
- James, Winford, 2003, What kind of question is this? Pt2.
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