[2] The term "Virgin Islands Creole" is formal terminology used by scholars and academics, and rarely used in everyday speech.
The Danish colonies St. Thomas and St. John had a European population of mainly Dutch origin, which led to enslaved Africans first creating a Dutch-based creole, known as Negerhollands.
Negerhollands was in mainstream usage on St. Thomas and St. John until the 19th century, when the British occupied the Danish West Indies from 1801 to 1802 and 1807 to 1815.
Unlike the continental European population of the other Danish West Indian islands, that of St. Croix was mostly of English, Irish and Scottish origin, which led to African slaves developing an English-based creole throughout the 18th and 19th centuries.
By the end of the 19th century, English creole completely replaced Negerhollands as the native dialect of St. Thomas and St. John.
The speech of St. Thomas and St. John shares distinct similarities with both the Crucian and British Virgin Islands variants.
Like most Anglophone Caribbean islands, a post-creole speech continuum exists, in which there are two extremes—standard English (known as the acrolect) and the creole in its most distinct, or raw, form (known as the basilect).
Due to the constant contact between standard English and Virgin Islands Creole in local society, there are many in-between speech varieties as well (known as mesolects).
Most native Virgin Islanders can easily maneuver this continuum depending on their mood, subject matter, or addressee.
Although no longer in common use among the younger population, it has been preserved in historical plays, folk songs and local literature.
Its most modern mesolectal form mainly derives from traditional Virgin Islands Creole terms, idioms, proverbs and sentence structure, with influences from African-American and Jamaican idioms, due to the prevalence of African-American and Jamaican mainstream pop culture in the Leeward Islands region.
The middle and upper classes tend to speak it informally among friends and at home, but code switch to Standard English in the professional sphere.
Virgin Islands Creole, while appreciated for its cultural value and widely used informally, is often seen as an impediment to economic and educational progress.
[citation needed] Because no standard spelling system exists in Virgin Islands Creole, those who attempt to write it use English orthography.
For example, the English phrase "I gave it to her" would translate to Ah gi'e it toh she in Virgin Islands Creole.
Another common pattern in Virgin Islands Creole is the absence of the letter "s" in the plural, possessive and third person present tense.
For example, the pronunciation of the standard English phrase "come here" would be come ya on St. Croix and come heh on St. Thomas, St. John and the British Virgin Islands.
For example, the word "special" is usually pronounced speshahl on St. Croix and speshuhl on St. Thomas, St. John, the British Virgin Islands, and St. Martin.