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Learn Jamaican Patois
Free guides, a full dictionary and practice you can do right here: what Patois words mean, how the grammar works, how to sound natural, and the culture behind the language.
Where do you want to start?
Beginner lessons
Start here: a step-by-step path from your first greeting to your first real conversation.
Patois dictionary
206 words and phrases, each with meaning, pronunciation, examples and usage notes.
Common words and expressions
The words you'll hear every single day, with links to every entry.
Conversational Patois
Real dialogues for meeting people, ordering food, family talk and liming with friends.
Grammar and sentence structure
How Patois actually works: pronouns, tense markers, negation and questions.
Pronunciation
The sounds, rhythm and spelling habits that make Patois sound like Patois.
Translation guides
How to say hello, thank you, I love you and more, and why word-for-word fails.
Jamaican slang
Dancehall, street and diaspora slang, and how it differs from Patois itself.
Culture and history
Where the language came from, and the music, food and history it carries.
Interactive learning
Quizzes, a word of the day and a phrase explorer you can use right here.
Most useful first reads
How to learn Jamaican Patois
Start with the pronouns (mi, yuh, im, wi, unnu, dem), the little tense words (a, did, ago, done) and a handful of everyday phrases, then listen to…
How to say hello in Jamaican Patois
The most common casual hello is Wah gwaan?
Is Jamaican Patois a language?
Yes. Linguists classify Jamaican Patois as an English-based creole language, Jamaican Creole, with its own grammar, sound system and vocabulary, not…
100 common Jamaican Patois words
The most useful Patois words are the small grammar words (mi, yuh, di, a, fi, deh, nuh), because they appear in almost every sentence.
Jamaican Patois grammar for beginners
Patois grammar is regular and learnable: verbs never change form, small words placed before the verb (a, did, a go, done) carry tense, pronouns keep…
Jamaican curse words explained
The strongest Jamaican swear words are the 'klaat' family: bumboklaat, raasklaat and bloodklaat.
What is Jamaican Patois?
Jamaican Patois, also written Patwa and called Jamaican Creole by linguists, is the everyday language of Jamaica. It took shape in the late 1600s and 1700s among enslaved Africans on Jamaican plantations. Most of its vocabulary comes from English, while much of its sound and grammar reflects West African languages such as Akan (Twi) and Igbo. It has its own consistent grammar: tense is marked with small words like did and a, plurals with dem, and the plural "you" with unnu.
Read more in Is Jamaican Patois a language? and the history of Jamaican Patois.