Abstract
This article looks at how four British-based poets born in the Caribbean exploit the rich language repertoire available to them in their work for children and young people. Following initial consideration of questions of definition and terminology, poetry collections by James Berry, John Agard, Grace Nichols and Valerie Bloom are discussed, with a focus on the interplay and creative tension between the different varieties of Caribbean creoles (“Bad Talk”) and standard English evident in their work. Variation both between the four poets’ usage and within each individual poet’s work is considered, and a trend over time towards the inclusion of fewer creole-influenced poems is noted. These and other issues, such as the labelling of the four poets’ work as ‘performance poetry’ and the nature of the poets’ contribution to British children’s literature, are considered in the conclusion.
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Michael Lockwood taught in schools in Oxford before becoming Associate Professor in English and Education at the University of Reading, UK from 1989 to 2013. He has recently retired from this post. Publications include Opportunities for English in the Primary School (1996), Promoting Reading for Pleasure in the Primary School (2008), which won him the United Kingdom Literacy Association’s Author Award for 2009, and, as editor, Bringing Poetry Alive: a Guide to Classroom Practice (2011). He contributed an article on “Ted Hughes: the Development of a Children’s Poet” to CLE in December 2009. He has also published classroom poetry resources and anthologies and has written his own poems for children.
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Lockwood, M. “Bad Talk” Made Good: Language Variety in Four Caribbean British Children’s Poets. Child Lit Educ 45, 74–88 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10583-013-9202-y
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10583-013-9202-y