Thread: Pon de replay

"Pon de replay" is a title of Rhianna's song, and I can in no way figure out the meaning of the three little words. Any idea???
Thanks in advance.

Sounds to me like it's 'Pon de Replay, or Upon the Replay in a mock-Jamaican accent.

Maybe it's Spanish - Put on replay....

It's 'broken English'.

Extract from an interview:

Sindy: For peeps out there who don't know what Pon De Replay means. Can you let them know?
Rihanna: It's just language that we speak in Barbados. It's broken English. Pon is on, De means the, so it's just basically telling the DJ to put my song on the replay.

Interview:

http://www.kidzworld.com/site/p5853.htm


So yeah, basurero was the closest.

thank you all very much

It's not english, it's Patua. (I don't actually know how it's written, but pronounced PAT-WAH) It can be a mixture of any caribbean language, or even accent, and english - therefore it's almost impossible for native speakers of English to speak like that.

As for what it means, I think it just means 'keep hitting the track' or something like that.

Patois

And it's a patois:

A patois is a regional dialect, especially one without a literary tradition. Also known as a creole. Nonstandard speech. The special jargon of a group.

It's not limited to the Carribean, or the English language.

Surzhyk, the mixture of Russian and Ukrainian could also be called a patois.

If jargon used as a term, it can't be applied to creoles.

I LOVE speaking Jamaican patois. Ras! Bumboclaat! And a quote from "The Lunatic", "me nuh wan see pum pum release de waater!". Bloodclaat... Mi mek fi lime wi dem trini beys dey.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patois