Trinidad and Tobago\u2019s way of talking has just been given a formal seal of approval. In its September 2026 update, the Oxford English Dictionary added eleven new words and phrases rooted in Caribbean English, and most of them come straight out of Trinbagonian speech: Carnival history, folk spirits, food, and the everyday sayings that get passed down in every household on the islands.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The update landed on 23 September 2026 and was picked up by wire services and Caribbean outlets alike. For TriniGo, it is a good excuse to slow down and look at where these words actually came from, because a few of them carry more history than a dictionary entry can fit in one line.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The Oxford English Dictionary updates its entries several times a year, adding words and senses that lexicographers judge to have enough documented, sustained use in written English. Being added is not the same as a word being invented or newly popular. Most of the eleven T&T entries have been in everyday use for decades, in some cases well over a century. What changed in September 2026 is that Oxford\u2019s editors traced and dated the written record closely enough to give each one a formal entry, with an origin, a definition, and a first-attestation date.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Coverage of the update, including a detailed breakdown from Caribbean Journal and an Associated Press wire story carried by outlets from Florida to Massachusetts, framed it as recognition of \u201ccenturies of movement and cultural exchange\u201d: African, European, Indian and Creole influences all showing up in one small batch of dictionary entries. Two Trinidad residents quoted in the AP story put it simply. Leonard Alexander, a grocery owner, on seeing \u201chornerman\u201d added: \u201cThat\u2019s our heritage, that\u2019s what we grew up with.\u201d Avionne George, a maintenance technician, said the formal recognition \u201chelps preserve tradition for the younger generations.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Trinbagonian<\/strong> is the word most people will recognise instantly: it means a person from Trinidad and Tobago. It now has both an adjective form (recorded from 1976) and a noun form (from 1988) in the dictionary. It has been the everyday demonym for decades, so its entry is less a discovery than a confirmation of something T&T has called itself for two generations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Canboulay<\/strong> carries far more weight. First recorded in 1871, the word comes from French Creole kann-boul\u00e9<\/em>, itself from the French cannes br\u00fbl\u00e9es<\/em>, \u201cburned cane\u201d. It describes the drumming, chanting, stick-fighting and masquerade processions that grew out of emancipation celebrations after 1834, when freed Africans marked the end of slavery with torchlit processions echoing the old cane-fire gangs of the plantations. Canboulay is widely regarded as the direct ancestor of modern Trinidad Carnival. Colonial authorities tried to ban drumming and stick-fighting in the 1880s, and those attempts triggered real riots in 1881 and 1884 that are still re-enacted every year at the start of Carnival. A word with that much history behind it earning a dictionary entry is a genuinely fitting piece of recognition.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Douen<\/strong> (documented from 1897) names one of the more unsettling figures in Trinidadian folklore: the spirit of a child who died before being baptised, said to wander with backwards-pointing feet and a wide-brimmed hat, calling children\u2019s names to lure them into the forest. Its origin is debated between Spanish duende<\/em> and the Efik word dwen<\/em>, itself a sign of how many languages have shaped Trinidadian speech over the centuries.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Jablesse<\/strong>, from Antillean Creole and ultimately the French diablesse<\/em> (\u201cfemale demon\u201d), is the shape-shifting spirit who appears as a beautiful woman, one cloven hoof hidden beneath her skirts, to lure men to their deaths at night. Both douen and jablesse belong to the same body of oral folklore, told and retold across Trinidad for generations, long before either word made it into print.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Peanut punch<\/strong>, documented from 1960, is the rich, blended drink of peanuts or peanut butter, milk, sugar and spices found on roadsides and in rum shops across Trinidad and Tobago. It is strongly associated with T&T, though it is not unique to the islands; versions also appear elsewhere in the Caribbean.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Sugar cake<\/strong> has the oldest documented record of all eleven entries, dating to 1844. It is the grated coconut confection cooked down with sugar, water, and spices, sold at school gates and market stalls under its full name, coconut sugar cake, as often as the short one. An 1844 attestation means this sweet has been part of written Trinidadian English for over 180 years, long before Trinidad and Tobago existed as an independent country.<\/p>\n\n\n\n To get on<\/strong>, traced to 1905, is the Caribbean usage for having an emotional or angry outburst, making a scene. Vex money<\/strong> (from 1974) is the cash, often kept by women, set aside for an emergency or an unexpected falling-out; the same term and concept exist in Nigerian English, another sign of the shared threads running between West African and Caribbean speech. Hornerman<\/strong> (from 1975) describes a man who is unfaithful to his partner, or the man an unfaithful woman is seeing on the side. It was Hornerman\u2019s inclusion, specifically, that prompted Leonard Alexander\u2019s comment to the Associated Press about recognising a heritage he grew up with. Wire coverage of the update also noted a further T&T idiom, \u201ccut someone\u2019s tail\u201d (to beat someone), circulating alongside the core eleven, another small piece of the same everyday vocabulary getting its moment in print.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Nana<\/strong> (maternal grandfather) and nani<\/strong> (maternal grandmother) are Hindi loanwords used throughout Trinidad and Tobago\u2019s Indo-Caribbean community, descendants of the Indian indentured labourers brought to the islands from 1845 onwards. Nani, in particular, serves as a respectful form of address for an older woman more broadly, not just within one\u2019s own family. Neither word is exclusive to T&T; both are used across the wider South Asian diaspora. Their inclusion nonetheless reflects how deeply Indian family language has woven itself into everyday Trinbagonian English.<\/p>\n\n\n\n None of these eleven words needed the Oxford English Dictionary\u2019s approval to be real. Every one of them has been spoken, sung, warned about or cooked long before a lexicographer wrote it down. What a formal entry does is put a documented, dated marker in the historical record: a word this old, used this consistently, belongs to English as much as any word with a tidier, more colonial pedigree.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It also draws a straight line through TriniGo\u2019s own cultural content, from Carnival\u2019s roots in Canboulay, through the folklore parents still use to keep children close to home after dark, to the food sold at every corner and the family words used at every kitchen table. Language is one of the more ordinary forms living heritage takes. This update reminds us that Trinidad and Tobago\u2019s version of English has always been its own, fully formed, not a variation waiting for outside validation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n How many Trinidad and Tobago words were added to the OED in 2026?<\/strong> Are all eleven words unique to Trinidad and Tobago?<\/strong> What is the oldest of the eleven words?<\/strong> Did the same OED update include words from other countries?<\/strong> Trinidad and Tobago\u2019s way of talking has just been given a formal seal of approval. In its September 2026 update, the Oxford English Dictionary added eleven new words and phrases rooted in Caribbean English, and most of them come straight out of Trinbagonian speech: Carnival history, folk spirits, food, and the everyday sayings that get […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":18882,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1073,965],"tags":[1611,1614,1417,978,1416,1615,1612,1610,1424,1613],"class_list":["post-18881","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-culture","category-our-history","tag-canboulay","tag-caribbean-english","tag-caribbean-heritage","tag-creole-1","tag-cultural-history-trinidad","tag-language-heritage","tag-oed","tag-trinbagonian","tag-trinidad-heritage","tag-trinidad-slang"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.trinigo.com\/trinidad-tobago\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18881","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.trinigo.com\/trinidad-tobago\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.trinigo.com\/trinidad-tobago\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.trinigo.com\/trinidad-tobago\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.trinigo.com\/trinidad-tobago\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18881"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.trinigo.com\/trinidad-tobago\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18881\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.trinigo.com\/trinidad-tobago\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/18882"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.trinigo.com\/trinidad-tobago\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18881"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.trinigo.com\/trinidad-tobago\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18881"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.trinigo.com\/trinidad-tobago\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18881"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Folklore: Douen, Jablesse<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
Food and drink: Peanut punch, Sugar cake<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
Everyday speech: To get on, Vex money, Hornerman<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
Family and Indo-Caribbean heritage: Nana, Nani<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
Why this matters<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
FAQ<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
Eleven words and phrases with Trinidad and Tobago roots were included in the fullest published breakdown of the Oxford English Dictionary\u2019s September 2026 update: Trinbagonian, canboulay, douen, jablesse, hornerman, peanut punch, sugar cake, to get on, vex money, nana and nani.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
No. Peanut punch is found elsewhere in the Caribbean, and nana\/nani are Hindi loanwords used across the South Asian diaspora and in Indo-Caribbean communities. The other nine are specifically Trinidad and Tobago in origin or strongest association.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Sugar cake, with a documented use dating to 1844, is the oldest recorded attestation among the eleven.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Yes. The same September 2026 update also added words from Bermudian English, and the update notes the T&T idiom \u201ccut someone\u2019s tail\u201d alongside the core eleven.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"