While gathering research articles for my project I came across a Youtube video of Shelome Gooden, a linguist, discussing her research on Creole language prosody in the 21st Centrury.

There is an absence of research on prosody and intonation in Creole language especially Belizean Kriol and so this discsussion was very informative for me. Gooden focoses on research pertaining to prosody of several Caribbean Creoles, and primarily focuses on Jamaican Creole (JC). Gooden highlights challenges and opportunities in creole language prosody research. She also emphasized that prosody is vital to the study of the evolution of, and variation in Creole languages and mentions that it played a role critical role in creole formation.

Gooden makes references to other research and states that there has been negative views towards Jamaican Creole and this contributes to sociophonetic differences. In Gooden’s research she uses instrumental data to contrast intonational patterns in Trinidadian Creole English and Jamaican Creole. She states JC and TC are generally assumed to have ‘hybrid’ prosodic systems between ‘stress’ languages and ‘pitch-accent’ languages. She ponders on what may constitute a tone language and the best way to investigate the history of prosodic patterns.

I was delighted to find a lingust that shares a similiar linguistic background as me because I can use her research as guidance when conducting my own research on Belizean Kriol and Belizean English.