Policies with regard to language in education in the Caribbean regionhave historically been formulated on the basis of considerations not necessarily related to the linguistic realities of the speech communities of the region. In the last two decades however political change and increased linguistic information have allowed adjustments to be made so that curricula might try to reflect to some extent goals that will satisfy the needs of the populations for which they were designed.

English is the official language in Jamaica as in all the Anglophone Caribbean islands. It is the language of the law courts, the banks, the established church, for example. It is the linguistic badge which one wears when one wants to identify with a certain level of sophistication, of linguistic competence, and of having “arrived” in a highly stratified society. Jamaican Creole, an English-related Creole, is the language of the people. It is the language they use in day-to-day relaxed situations.

The appearance in 1981 of a paper by Sarah Michaels in I which the “topic-associating" style of reporting used by black first-graders in a California school is contrasted with the more highly valued “topic-centred” style of their white classmates, led me to wonder whether these students might be responding to what Dell Hymes (1980) refers to as norms of their respective communities.

The importance to educational practice of linguistic research in the Caribbean has never been underplayed. Although linguistic descriptions have a validity all their own, it is in their application to educational practice that they can best serve our societies.

"April comes in
with yellow poui
defining Mona..."