Tuesday, 15 October 2013

John Agard - Mr Oxford Don

A2 English Language

John Agard - Mr Oxford Don



"me not no oxford don"- instead of using the present possessive, personal pronoun of "my" he replaces it with  the 1st person object pronoun of "me". this is frequent in Jamaican creole, it maybe that English and Jamaican were languages were forced to communicate therefore have got confused with the English grammar, therefore has become common in Jamaican creole. As when people that speak Jamaican creole may pass it down to their children and then carries on as a language.

"Mr oxford Don"- "don" is Jamaican lexis for a boss or someone in higher position than yourself. It is now also used in Multicultural language (this is a mixture of dialect from standard English, Asian and Jamaican, it is very frequent in the eastern parts of London as shown through the media)

what is he trying to say
" a man on the run is a dangerous one" as he is speaking in a Jamaican accent, he is emphasising that "oxford don" accuses Jamaican people of being dangerous as they have came from a different country.  He might be saying this because of their accents in which is shown throughout this poem. "I didn't graduate, I immigrate" this shows he is trying to say that just because he didn't graduate from school, it doesn't mean he is not educated. he has just immigrated from another country.

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