Re: Odp: Phonetics

From: Piotr Gasiorowski
Message: 838
Date: 2000-01-10

 
----- Original Message -----
From: Jeffrey S. Jones
To: cybalist@eGroups.com
Sent: Monday, January 10, 2000 4:32 AM
Subject: [cybalist] Re: Phonetics

> As far as I know, L-vocalisation occurs in some American accents as
well, especially in the "hick"
> accents of the South and less commonly in NYC English. Postvocalic
/l/ may be "half-vocalised"
> there, with the tip of the tongue still raised slightly but not
making full contact with the alveolar
> ridge. I suspect this is what Iuri has observed in the case of
postvocalic /l/ in Portuguese.
>    
> Piotr
L-vocalization (and also simplification of final consonant clusters) is
a feature of Black American English. I don't recall hearing it
(L-vocalization) in other dialects (not counting the mute L of course).
BTW, which people have the "hick" accents? AFAIK "hick" is a term used
only by northeast urbanites to refer to anybody else.
Jeff
It is indeed a well-known feature of Black English, but has also been reported from some Southern accents before a following labial or velar (according to Wells 1982), so that help [he@...] rhymes with step [ste@...] (/e/ is "broken", i.e. diphthongised before a following /p/ in the drawled pronunciation of the South). The pronunciation is stigmatised even locally; "hick" or "low-class" was how some American informants characterised it.
 
According to many authors Southern dark /l/ may also be replaced by the velar lateral [L], a curious articulation in which the back of the tongue is raised and no contact is made by the tip or the blade of the tongue. It is used especially after /@/ (schwa) and lax /u/, with which it coalesces into a syllabic lateral: wolf [wL:f], bull [bL:].
 
Wells provides a firsthand report and a detailed description of "imperfect laterals" (with no alveolar contact) in NYC. Other authors also describe this pronunciation, apparently "not confined to uncultivated speech".
 
As for my own experience, I recall hearing vocalised Ls in recordings of Philadelphia English collected by Sharon Ash. They were used not only in the word-final position but also intervocalically!
 
Piotr