/l/ vocalization

[Laurence Horn]

At 10:59 PM -0400 3/20/08, Mark Mandel wrote:
>On Thu, Mar 20, 2008 at 6:28 AM, Dennis Preston <preston at msu.edu> wrote:
>
>>  Wilson,
>>
>>  I've always taken these to be hypercorrections by those of us who
>>  vocalilze our postvocallic /l/s. They were very common pronunciations
>>  in my parts of the South Midlands (Southern IL & IN, and Northern and
>>  Western KY among older working class speakers, white and black.
>
>"Ellum" is attested from New England 150 years ago:
>
>>  The hubs of logs from the "Settler's ellum," --
>>  Last of its timber, -- they could n't sell 'em,
>>

A lot older than Deep Ellum Blues.  But those blues are named for the
eponymous street and neighborhood in Dallas--how far back does that
go?

LH

>
>>>From "The Deacon's Masterpiece Or, The Wonderful 'One-Hoss Shay': A
>Logical Story", by Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. 1858.
>
>poem: http://www.americanpoems.com/poets/Oliver-Wendell-Holmes/16658
>date:
>http://www.americanheritage.com/articles/magazine/ah/1972/1/1972_1_108.shtml
>
>--
>Mark Mandel
>
>------------------------------------------------------------
>The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org

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The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org