I’m a Londoner in Jamaica. Well, at least that’s where I was raised. But here? On the streets of Kingston, at a corner shop in Mandeville, in clubs and casual encounters alike — they call me “English.”
At first, I found it puzzling. After all, we all speak English, don’t we? But it dawned on me quite quickly — this wasn’t about the language. This was about identity. Here in Jamaica, people tend to call it as they see it. No frills, no complications. A white house is the White House. A man with dreadlocks is simply “Rasta.” A bald man? “Baldy.” A painter’s assistant might just get nicknamed “Brush.” It’s not rude — it’s cultural shorthand. A kind of warm, pragmatic categorisation of the world.
So, of course, I became “English.”
And it got me thinking.
If I’m of Jamaican parentage, if I’ve spent a great deal of time here, if I even know the backroads of St. Elizabeth better than some people born and raised in the parish — then why am I still seen as “English”? Where do I truly belong? Where…
