Suriname creoles: phonology Conclusion

The Saramaccan form  ‘broad’ just quoted illustrates by itself how far removed phonologically the Suriname creoles are from the – standard and substandard – London English on which they are ultimately based. This form begins with an African substrate-derived implosive stop. Then we have a vowel that is in origin an epenthetic vowel whose function was to break up the original liquid cluster. The liquid itself has been lost although it was still present in the 18th century. Then we have a vowel from the LOT set, but bearing a high tone. The original final /d/ was first subject to liquefaction, and then lost. Finally we have an anaptyctic vowel /-i/, whose original function was to prevent the occurrence of final consonants. The only segments corresponding directly to the original structure are the  and the /á/, and even they are very un-English!