Linguistic Laziness
It seems that most of us Jamaicans pronounce our ‘O’s something like ‘A’s. As an example, we have a couple of lottery-like games that we play out here, one called Cash Pot and another called Drop Pan, but when the advertisements are played on the radio, they are really saying “Cash Pat” and “Drap Pan”.
I’ve been thinking about it and I believe that it is a result of what I will call “linguistic laziness”, maybe… We do know how to say the right thing, of course, but unless we are in a really formal setting, we often relax and lapse into this habitual pronounciation of the letter ‘O’.
I think that it takes more work to shape the mouth in the position necessary to pronounce an ‘O’ sound than it does to make the ‘A’ sound. As a result, most of us don’t shape our mouths properly, resulting in our ‘O’ coming out somewhat more like an ‘A’.
So last night, a lady who lives in our complex was celebrating her birthday. She had a few friends around, including a couple of men who seemed to be engaged in farming. They spent a lot of the time talking about their farms, telling us how business was bad, and how long it took for various crops to grow, and other information like that. Of course, this was relaxed company, so they were pronouncing their ‘O’s like ‘A’s, right?
One of them said, “I’m thinking of putting in a crap of plaintains soon.”. The other one replied “I am going to put in a couple of new craps in August”.
Another of the guests asked the lady where the bathroom was. She gave him directions, and as he headed off in the direction she had indicated, he left the parting shot “I don’t know about the rest of you but I can’t wait. I’m going to put a crap in right now!“. 
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Hope his cra(o)p bore the expected fruit! Anyhow, I don’t know about any ‘linguistic laziness’ as you call it, but as far as I’m aware it is frequently poeple who have a poor educational background that speak this way. Similarly they will add and drop the letter H. (eg. they will pronounce hospital as ‘ospital).
I certainly don’t speak this way, and as far as I’m aware, you don’t either.
Yeah, southern regions like Oklahoma, Texas, Arkansas, people use lazy dialects like that, I did a post about that kind of thing, sort of, today. That’s a great story about the guy planting his crap in the bathroom! Unfortunately for him, we reap what we sow, eh?
Funny comebacks, guys!
Heh.
But, I LOVE the way Jamaicans speak. There’s a special lilt and rhythm to it. O’s as A’s or vice versa….I don’t mind. It’s part of the beauty.
I love that accent too!
English sucks. Hello people! there IS a ‘t’ in ‘what’ ‘ninety one’ ‘computer’….ect…