Language in Jamaica

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Most Jamaicans speak Jamaican Creole, also known locally as Patois (Patwa). Jamaican pronunciation and vocabulary are significantly different from English, despite heavy usage of English words or derivatives. Jamaican Creole is almost exclusively used when Jamaicans speak between one another. In all other cases (especially around tourists) English is used.

Although all Jamaicans can speak English, Westerners may have trouble understanding them. It's English, but a heavily accented version. Even the billboards use the Jamaican phoenetic slang, like "Ebery 'ting is ah right" to mean "Everything is alright." Some Jamaicans speak a little bit of the other popular languages, like Spanish.

You may hear some Jamaicans say "Waah gwan?", "Waah appen?" or "what tah gwan", which is the patois variation of "What's up?" or "What's going on?". More formal greetings are usually "Good morning", or "Good evening".

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Jamaica: Language is based on work by jan, D. Guillaime, ChubbyWimbus, Inas, Hiltongosocial, Edison9114, Knowzilla, iGuide, and others. Jamaica Travel Guide & Jamaica Interactive Map is available under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 1.0. See background image credits.