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Beryl Loftman Bailey: Africanist Woman Linguist in New York State
One of the least known stories outside linguistics circles is the story of the life and contributions of Dr. Beryl Loftman Bailey. Bailey is the first African American woman linguist, and one of the first women chairs of a Department of Black Studies in the State of New York.
Dr. Bailey was an adopted New Yorker, having been born in Black River, Jamaica, West Indies on January 15, 1920. Her parents were both school teachers. Thus Bailey grew up valuing education and was an honor student at Wolmer's Girls' School. After completing high school and college with distinction, she accepted an appointment to teach English literature and composition at the Bethlehem Training College, a local institution run by the Moravian Church for preparing women teachers.(2)
Although Bailey grew up in a bi-dialectal environment, speaking both Jamaican Creole and Standard English, it was during her years as an English teacher in Jamaica from 1942- 1948 that she became more acutely aware of the differences between native Jamaican speech and Standard English. That awareness eventually resulted in Bailey's becoming one of the scholars who played a major role in the debates which led to the development of Pidgin and Creole Studies as a respected discipline in the 1960's.
Once Bailey came to New York in 1948, she stayed to become a New Yorker, returning to Jamaica only for visits and to conduct field work in 1956 and 1960-62. On January 20, 1952, she married Neville Bailey, and together they became the parents of two daughters, Stephanie and Jennifer.(3)
The purpose of this paper is to explore the contribution of Dr. Beryl Bailey to Pidgin and Creole linguistics, mentioning also her role in Black Studies between 1955 and 1975. Although there is not complete agreement on a definition of pidgins and creoles, it is generally agreed that a pidgin is a rudimentary language created in a situation such as war, slavery or trade, in which two groups having no language in common must learn to speak together quickly. A creole is a pidgin which has native speakers and has developed stable norms. Although there are pidgins and creoles in the Orient, Hawaii, Africa,India,and other areas of the world,...