Dear Editor,

There has been a frenzy on social media bearing the hashtag #CommentateLikeGrace. This epitomises the criticism the majority of our Jamaican people receive when they do public speaking.

Grace Jackson and Portia Simpson Miller are products of a system failure. They are competent in their specialised areas, but have issues with English Language. I am sure that they would wow you if they expressed themselves in Jamaican instead.

Many of our public figures suffer from a chronic failure to express themselves in the English Language. They are not articulate.

I am very inept at speaking the language, though I write it a little better. This grave problem points to the merits and faults of the language application in Jamaica. Coupled with the curriculum failure in schools, the following point, I believe, is at the root of the problem.

There is limited opportunity for many students to practise the language orally. Yes! There is not an oral exam or practicum to the language delivery in schools in Jamaica. Students who try to apply the lessons learnt are stigmatised as “stush” when they speak it in local community settings. Young people don’t find it “cool” to use it on the corner, as they are ridiculed; they are seen as ‘know-it-alls’, ‘gwaan-likes’ and ‘chatter boxes’. Adults don’t encourage it! I remember hearing someone ask, “Ah wen u lan’ massa?”

It sounds funny to ourselves when we speak it, but rather than struggle through, we become embarrassed and run back to our vernacular. Such is the disabling environment we grew up in, but we are expected to become native English experts.

Congratulations to those who master the language and speak it well.

When our peers are required to give speeches, Jamaicans, from all levels of English proficiency, sit and destructively criticise each other, and laugh, instead of lobbying for changes in the curriculum and advocating for change to the cultural response of community members to “stush” individuals.

Let us provide the enabling environment to breed fluent English speakers. Encourage our young ones to use it frequently in all spheres, and break the culture of low tolerance ‘on the corner’. I would love to see oral exams added to the curriculum. Let us be the change we want to see.

Carline Ellis

Old Harbour, St Catherine

petashan@hotmail.com