Chapter 12: Discourse, Globalization, and the Translocalization of Gangspeak: Evidence from Trinidad

Studies on the language used among gang members and members of the underworld are usually glossaries from metropolitan locations, which do not include the language used by their Caribbean counterparts (Green, 2011; Knox, 1997; Roman, 2014). In addition, glossaries or dictionaries from these non–Caribbean locations do not usually highlight cultural and linguistic resources from other international contexts as influencing the language use of gang members in their own communities.

In this context, the current study examines the translocalization of lexicon in the gang-related communities of Trinidad as evidence of “the transporting of signs or objects attached to one place into those other places, where they can be reinterpreted otherwise” (Pennycook, 2007, p. 79). As can be expected, the language in use in these gang communities draws its sociocultural and sociolinguistic characteristics from local and global contexts. This results in the transidiomatic practice of creating a combined code of linguistic resources from a range of communicative channels, both local and distant. Given the communities of practice surrounding gang operations and the global spread of hip-hop, rap, and dancehall, this study explores the extent to which the transidiomatic effects from these sources, among others, are similar in more than one gang-community within Trinidad.