Race/racism and the late Prof. Frederic G. Cassidy

[Wilson Gray]

My impression of the sub-titling of "The Harder They Come" is slightly
different from yours, Beverly. It seems to me that the subtitles
appear only when the dialogue is such any native speaker of any
variety of English can understand what's being said. Otherwise, the
viewer is on his own! :-) As when the fair-complexioned detective,
switching into creole, said to the black peasant:

"Me stop chase Ivan. Me start chase you!"

-WIlson

On 11/3/06, Beverly Flanigan <flanigan at ohio.edu> wrote:
> ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Beverly Flanigan <flanigan at OHIO.EDU>
> Subject:      Re: Race/racism and the late Prof. Frederic G. Cassidy
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> I forgot to mention what is perhaps obvious: Fred's father's Canadian
> English would not have been British either, and it probably sounded less
> "British" than his mother's Jamaican English (I'm not referring to Creole,
> of course).  Incidentally, I was always under the impression Fred was
> "mixed," since I first met him in 1978 or so.  (I actually got a letter
> from him in 1960, telling me he had no more financial aid for me at
> Wisconsin--so I went to St. Louis U instead; but I still have his lovely
> letter!)   As someone else pointed out, the "Black" majority in Jamaica
> comes in all shades.
>
> One more incidentally: If you see "The Harder They Come," you'll note that
> the film starts out with English subtitles for the Creole dialogue and then
> drops them about halfway through on the assumption that the audience will
> have caught on to the "Patois" by then--not always a safe assumption!
>
> -----------------
> It's common for many Jamaicans to speak both Standard Jamaican English
> (SJE)--which is not really "British" English but sounds closer to it than
> to American English--and Jamaican Creole (JC).  The schools teach SJE, but
> the vernacular of most people is JC, especially young people in their peer
> groups; a varied continuum exists between the two.  I suspect this is what
> is meant in the passage below.
>
> At 09:03 PM 11/1/2006, you wrote:
> >On the web I find a memorial resolution of the University of Wisconsin
> >faculty containing the following information:
> >
> >"Cassidy's interest in Creole English came naturally enough -- he was born
> >in Kingston, Jamaica, in 1907, to a Canadian father and a Jamaican mother.
> >He grew up hearing their two varieties of standard British English and the
> >Creole variety of the Black majority as well."
> >
> >I'm not certain how to interpret this, but it sounds like his mother was
> >Jamaican but not a member of the Black majority.
> >
> >Fred Shapiro
> >
> >
> >--------------------------------------------------------------------------
> >Fred R. Shapiro                             Editor
> >Associate Librarian for Collections and     YALE BOOK OF QUOTATIONS
> >   Access and Lecturer in Legal Research     Yale University Press
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--
Everybody says, "How hard it is that we have to die"---a strange
complaint to come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
-----
Whoever has lived long enough to find out what life is knows how deep
a debt of gratitude we owe to Adam, the first great benefactor of our
race. He brought death into the world.

--Sam Clemens

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