Part of the pronunciation section of Patwa Partner — how to physically make the sounds of Jamaican Patois.
Same idea, other side a di mouth. English go, boat, stone, know → Patois glide from an OO down into an AW: guo, buot, stuon, nuo. Again, di JLU spelling uo a di instruction inna order.
🔤 Di symbol dem, explained
/uo/ — Another diphthong — oo sliding into aw inna one beat.
👅 Mek di sound
Start pon di vowel inna English boot. Tongue high an BACK, lips round up tight like yuh a whistle.
Keep di sound going an slide down an open into di vowel inna English bought. Jaw drop, tongue come down.
Lips stay ROUNDED di whole way through. Dem loosen, but dem never spread. If dem spread, yuh lose it.
Weight pon di second half again. Di oo a di runway.
Add di consonant: g-uo. guo.
🎞 Watch di mouthDi side view show yuh di tongue — di one ting yuh cyaan check inna a mirror. Di front view a di one yuh can. Tap any word inna di ladder below fi move di mouth pon dat word.
✋🏾 Feel check — do it nowRound yuh lips like yuh a whistle an seh oo. Hold di round shape an just drop yuh jaw. Dat a uo. Yuh should feel di roundness di whole time, never losing it.
⚠️ Weh people slipEnglish oh glide di opposite direction an FINISH wid di lips tightening. Patois OPEN up. Quick self-test: if yuh lips tighter at di end dan at di start, yuh did it backward.
🪜 Practice ladder
Step one — one word at a time. Tap ▶ fi hear it, den seh it back.
seh it
JLU
English
go
guo
go
boat
buot
boat
stone
stuon
stone
know
nuo
know
coat
kuot
coat
road
ruod
road
Step two — di phrase.
PhraseMi nuo seh — I know that…
Step three — di full sentence. Dis a di one fi record.
SentenceHim guo dung di ruod wid di kuot pon him 'an — He went down the road with the coat on his arm
🎙 Seh it backRecord yuhself pon di sentence, den play di two back to back. Yuh own ear a di judge — dat a how di mouth learn.
🎚 Mout Check — look pon weh yuh just didYuh hear yuhself back up top. Dis show yuh di same ting inna two picture yuh ear cyaan draw: weh yuh tongue deh, an how even yuh beat dem run.
Sources
Frederic G. Cassidy, Jamaica Talk: Three Hundred Years of the English Language in Jamaica (1961), p. 36 [fieldwork 1952–59]
boat likewise starts high and glides down — nearer BU-ot. Same falling direction as the /ie/ page, which is why the two are taught together.
Frederic G. Cassidy, Jamaica Talk: Three Hundred Years of the English Language in Jamaica (1961), p. 44 [fieldwork 1952–59]
The /uo/ reaches beyond the boat words: /uonyan/ onion, /huovn/ oven. But it is meaning-conditioned in places — /tuoch/ is the torchwood sense only; an electric torch is /taach/.
The described rules come from the published work above. The teaching, the wording and the animation are mine.