Language has long been acknowledged as a site of contestation in the Creole-anglophone Caribbean. English has, traditionally, been the exclusive language of both literary text and critical analysis. Conversely, the various Creoles of the Caribbean are not generally recognized as languages, let alone appropriate modes of literary expression. Debates about this contentious issue became a major flashpoint in the 1950s with the publication of V. S. Reid’s New Day (1949) and Sam Selvon’s The Lonely Londoners (1953) in which Creole-speaking characters take centre stage. These debates gathered impetus in the 1970s with the publication of Merle Hodge’s Crick Crack, Monkey, Mervyn Morris’ positioning of Louise Bennett as a ‘serious’ writer following the publication of her volume Jamaica Labrish (1966), and Kamau Brathwaite’s 1970 establishment of the journal Savacou, all of which engaged the vernacular as a literary language. The growing influence of sociopolitical eruptions such as the Rastafari movement and Black Power also signified influential developments in the thinking about language. Through an examination of poetry and prose, the chapter assesses the significance of the historical debates about language beginning in the eighteenth century and concluding with a brief discussion of the legacy of these contestations in the present.

Introduction

In Chapter 1 we presented a model of rehabilitation that highlights the range of theories that may be drawn upon to support the identification and development of interventions for the many consequences of brain injury or illness. The case presented here highlights in practice how cognitive neuropsychological intervention (as defined by Coltheart (2005)) can be integrated into neuropsychological rehabilitation, with a specific emphasis on communication and numeracy. The importance of learning method is also raised both in terms of learning specific skills or information as well as functional generalization.

We describe our work with Lorna as a further example of our interdisciplinary approach, in which team members worked in an integrated way with the client towards shared functional goals. Significantly, Lorna's level of communication was initially considered a potential barrier to her ability to benefit from the groups and participate fully in the therapeutic milieu process. Subsequently these concerns appeared largely unfounded.

Once again a formulation-based approach provided a means of integrating assessment results, developing a collaborative understanding regarding the client's needs and building a basis upon which to address these across the team. The case highlights specific and successful interventions for naming and numeracy difficulties, as well as development of compensatory strategies, together applied to increase participation in meaningful activities as part of the integrated rehabilitation programme.

History of injury

Lorna suffered a brain injury in May 1999 whilst living and working abroad.

From a social cognitive and developmental perspective, we offer a content-based explanation for age differences in social judgment biases when individuals are presented with relationship dilemmas. Older adults' tendency to blame individuals for negative outcomes in relationship situations may reflect age-related differences in the nature and content of information stored in long-term memory (knowledge, beliefs, and values) that are relevant to the particular social judgment. Older adults may have highly schematized social rules for appropriate behavior that are chronically accessible and drive social judgments in particular situations, especially in the domain of marital relationships. In addition, we suggest that changes in emotional functioning as we grow older also impact the attributional processes in the context of marital relationships.

There is a substantive body of research examining the importance of social cognitive mechanisms in understanding adaptive social relationships. These include how relationship enhancing attributions relate to marital satisfaction (Bradbury & Fincham, 1990; Lopez, 1993), how selectively attending to negative aspects of a relationship creates relationship distress (Baucom, Epstein, Sayers, & Sher, 1989; Sillars, Roberts, Leonard, & Dun, 2000), how individuals preserve positive self-views in the context of a relationship (Fincham & Beach, 1999), and the accessibility of attitudes, values, and beliefs when engaging in interpersonal interactions (Baldwin, 1992; Fincham & Beach, 1999). Individual differences in the influence of such cognitive representations and processes may help us to differentiate adaptive from dysfunctional cognitions in dealing with relationship situations across the life span.