strawl

[Paul Johnston]

Aren't a lot of the realizations of the vowel in straw(l) actually (and secondarily) diphthongal in a great deal of the South, like [DU] (where [D] = a low back rounded vowel), and, according to John Wells, Southerners often have a true velar lateral without alveolar contact, if not a completely vocalized /l/.  Given these two things, intrusive /l/ makes perfect sense.

Also, cf. Bristolian intrusive /l/, for which this British city--originally Bristow-- is famous.  A lot of people from Bristol settled the US, especially in the far North and far South....

Paul Johnston
On May 18, 2013, at 2:16 PM, Herb Stahlke <hfwstahlke at GMAIL.COM> wrote:

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> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Herb Stahlke <hfwstahlke at GMAIL.COM>
> Subject:      Re: strawl
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> I have heard speakers, not just in the South, add "dark /l/" at the end of
> words after the vowel /aw/.  I've even heard it before suffixes as in
> "drawling" for "drawing."  Phonologically, I think it's the interpretation
> of the /U/ quality of final /l/, what linguists call velarization, the
> raising of the back of the tongue towards the soft palate.  But why this
> happens after a low vowel like /aw/ isn't clear.
>
> Herb
>
>
> On Sat, May 18, 2013 at 9:19 AM, Charles C Doyle <cdoyle at uga.edu> wrote:
>
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>> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>> Poster:       Charles C Doyle <cdoyle at UGA.EDU>
>> Subject:      strawl
>>
>> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>
>> A former student of mine, who teaches in McDonough GA (between Macon and
>> Atlanta), sent this:
>>
>> << There's a landscape place near us that advertises "pinestrawl" for sale
>> (not for sell, mind you), and I thought it was just a mistake last spring;
>> . . . they have "pinestrawl" for sale (not sell) again this spring. >>
>>
>> --Charlie
>>
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