Note: This is the re-issue of a previously published book.

Originally published in 1966, Beryl Loftman Bailey’s book was one of the first on the Jamaican Creole language, its origins and its influence on the teaching of English in Jamaica. A native Jamaican herself, Bailey’s personal experience of both learning and later teaching English in the Caribbean was a springboard to her interest in the problems of language interference in contact situations. She challenged a notion prevalent throughout English teachers in Caribbean at the time that Creole was a ‘dialect’ not a language and therefore need not be considered in teaching. The social implications of this view are also explored. Bailey’s detailed analysis of Jamaican Creole phonology, morphology, kernel sentence structure and simple and double-based transformations provided valuable insights into the foundations of the language and its educational implications.