Table of Contents

Foreword to the first edition Rex Nettleford; Preface; Dread talk - the speech of the Rastafari in Jamaica; The social history of dread talk; Rastafarian language in St Lucia and Barbados; Dread talk - the speech of Rastafari in modern Jamaican poetry; The lexicon of dread talk in standard Jamaican English; Globalization and the language of Rastafari; The road of the dread - Lorna Goodison

Promotional Information

A penetrating work in the socio-linguistics of Rasta culture

Reviews

"Dread Talk is one of the most dramatic examples of the imbrication of language, culture and society to be found anywhere, and no one has explored this topic with as much sensitivity, detail, and insight as Velma Pollard. I regard this book as required reading for sociolinguists and linguistic anthropologists, and I recommend it enthusiastically to scholars in social and cultural anthropology, sociology, comparative literature, lexicography, Caribbean Studies, and Africana/Black Studies." John R. Rickford, Martin Luther King, Jr., Centennial Professor of Linguistics and Director, African and Afro-American Studies, Stanford University.