Bob warned us to keep our culture and don’t be afraid of the vultures

BY MICHAEL THOMAS

“The West has often caricatured Caribbean ways of speaking in their music and movies, and within the Caribbean, working-class and rural ways of speaking can easily become the butt of the joke. If caricatures become dominant on social media, then those who use these languages are at risk of further marginalization.”

These are the words of one Dr. Kris Singh, who is an English instructor at KPU (aka Kwantlen Polytechnic University). According to Singh, our way of speaking usually makes us the butt of jokes in Western movies, and he demonstrates how the use of Caribbean vernacular on social media is frequently linked with humour, resulting in serious posts being misinterpreted as jokes.

Singh’s piece is published in Archipelagos, a peer-reviewed, open-access journal of Caribbean Digital Praxis.

The article argues the use of vernacular in social media risks de-contextualization, distortion, and willful misinterpretation. “Audiences have been primed,” Singh says, “to hear Caribbean vernacular as funny or without political consequence,” he wrote.

Straight out the gate let me just say that this is what this is all about. “Willful misinterpretation.”

As a Caribbean man who has lived in Canada for over 30 years, I still encounter folks who pretend that they cannot understand what I am saying. This is done primarily to discredit the individual and whether it is on social media or in person it needs to be addressed. That said, let’s dive deeper into the findings of this piece.

Mr. Singh points us to Trinidadian digital creator Stephon Felmine as an example. Felmine uses what Western society will call an unconventional approach to teach the ABCs and 123s in Trinidadian English, which have earned him six-figure likes.

“No teacher would ever teach the ABCs using these words. That’s the joke. There’s a sort of ironic humour at play, and by getting the joke, that’s how identity is consolidated,” says Singh.

Singh referred to a survivor’s testimony of a volcano eruption in St. Vincent since serious reflections from the survivor were interpreted as humorous on social media.

“Users of Caribbean vernacular are less likely to be seen as emotionally and psychologically complex and are more likely to be pushed out of political discourse. This means that during times of disaster their needs are less likely to be met and their testimonies are received as entertaining.”

How can the testimony of a survivor of a volcano’s wrath be seen as entertaining? Isn’t this heartless? Who does this?

The Nubian people who were brought to America until recently were always given comical roles in Hollywood movies. Extra Black faces, swollen red lips, and speaking like toddlers, all in the name of humour.

This educator’s findings are not surprising. Life teaches us many lessons. As for me, I have learned that people make the effort to learn when they want to and find faults when it is in their best interest.

Arnold Schwarzenegger’s English lingo is a thousand times more messed up than most Caribbean people that I know, yet Americans made him Governor of California. Nothing to see here.

After looking up Stephon Felmine on Tik Tok I realized he is Trinidadian, and I being a Caribbean man understood him 100%.

I have noticed what I deemed a very dangerous trend among Caribbean content creators on Tik Tok: the use of AI audio to explain simple Caribbean terms.

I hope these users realize that once they keep up this trend, AI might be the content creator and not them. This is what is called training one’s own replacement.

In conclusion, I would have loved to ask Dr. Singh if his research came up with any negative Western ideas on AI. What is the benefit of using a machine that does not know anything about Jamaica or Trinidad to speak on the subject? Why are users of these platforms encouraged to use these emotionally empty voices?