Consonants r, l

Rhoticity is slightly more frequent in JamC than in LonVE, where it only occurs post-vocalically in linking or intrusive mode. Wells (1982: 577) describes the variable occurrence of /r/ in historically r-ful words as semi-rhotic, noting that /r/ is lost more often before consonants in JamC than syllable-finally. It undergoes further attrition in BrC. While /r/ is retained most often in JamC for NURSE, NORTH and START words, no pattern has emerged in BrC.

In both JamC and StJamE, all laterals are clear including syllabics. Consequently there is no l-vocalization. This feature was notoriously not assimilated to EngE by the adult immigrant generation of Jamaicans (Wells 1973). They did alter the JamC rule for velarizing alveolar stops before syllabic /l/, adapting /bakl/ ‘bottle’, /niigl/ ‘needle’ to /batl/, /niidl/. Both pronunciations are found in the BrC of younger generations, who are not prestige-driven in the same way, and so produce basilect-focused tokens like Ku kekl a kos pot ‘Look at the kettle cursing the pot’ (Sutcliffe and Figueroa 1992: 83). There is some evidence for dark  creeping into the speech of Jamaicans who came as children to London, where L-vocalization continues apace in LonVE: such speakers retain clear [l] in chil(d) but may have  in goal, ghoul, and even vocalization in old and syllabic fatal, beetle (with /t/).