Bennett, Louise. "'Bans O' Killing' by Louise Bennett." Throughlines. www.throughlines.org/suite-content/bans-o-killing-by-louise-bennett. [Date accessed].

"Bans O' Killing" by Louise Bennett

Audio performance by Aisha Ricketts

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Jonathan Hsy
George Washington University

“Bans O' Killing” is a satirical poem written in Jamaican creole or 'patois' by Louise Bennett. In it, Bennett names the historical mechanisms of power and violence that accompany cultural claims of one “standard” English. Channeling Shakespeare and Chaucer as exemplar non-"standard" English writers, she challenges the hierarchies that language policing reinforces. This audio recording was produced for Jonathan Hsy's Throughlines contribution, Chaucer's Englishes.

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