Uvular /l/ (Was: velarized /l/ again)

[Laurence Horn]

At 7:23 PM -0400 3/12/09, Neal Whitman wrote:
>Clarification: When they talk about "velar /l/" here, they mean velarIZED
>(and I think most of them do write 'velarized' instead of 'velar', just as
>in the title of the post). As at least one poster has pointed out, a
>velarIZED /l/ is indeed alveolar: The tongue tip touches the alveolar ridge,
>but even so, at the same time, the back of the tongue rises somewhat as
>well. (Is it higher than it goes for the [i] sound, an issue you've brought
>up? I don't know, but I do know it goes up. If you don't do it, your /l/s
>sound a little off, like Jerry Reed calling the judge a "hillbilly" in "When
>You're Hot, You're Hot, or like Snigdha Prakash when she says "dollars.")
>
>However, when I talk about a uvular /l/, I do mean uvular. I know from
>personal experience of making my /l/s this way as a kid that the tip of my
>tongue stayed on the floor of my mouth, and the back of my tongue touched
>the way back part of my soft palate (i.e. uvula). This sound really doesn't
>have anything in common with /l/ at all from an articulatory perspective
>(other than being a voiced continuant). The airstream is not escaping along
>the sides of the tongue, as it does for alveolar /l/; it's coming out the
>nose, as it does for [m, n, N]. The only reason I call it an /l/ is that
>people who use it really do use it as their realization of /l/. All I can
>guess is that acoustically it must bear a fair resemblance to alveolar /l/.
>And to make it, I suggest starting to make the [N] ("ng") sound and really
>stretch it out. While you're doing that, slowly slide your tongue backwards
>so that the contact point is maybe 5mm further back, and then you'll
>probably be making this sound. And if you want to hear what one sounds like,
>listen to Ira Glass on any episode of This American Life; I'm almost
>positive that's how he's making his /l/s.
>
>Neal
>

I wonder if that's what up with Steven King's weird (to me)-sounding
/l/s.  I don't listen to Ira Glass, but I've heard King read a number
of his stories/novels on tape, and there's something that's always
struck me as...well, different about those /l/s, but I couldn't put
my finger on it.  (If it's his uvula, just as well I didn't try
putting my finger on it.)

LH

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