Is "l" a semivowel or a consonant?

[GoodTaste]

If it is a semivowel, then "s" behind "rule" would be pronounced as /s/ rather than /z/ when "l" is considered as a consonant. I am not sure.

Perhaps some native English speakers don't care about whether "rules" is pronounced as /ru:ls/ or /ru:lz/, especially when they have regional accents.

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(1) Well done! You are cool.
(2) Are you willing to abide by the rules?

[GoodTaste]

OK. I rechecked out my paper-version grammar book and found "l" is a voiced consonant.

[GoodTaste]

It is normally voiced, though it is devoiced when in follows /p/ or /k/ n a stressed syllable.

"It follows..."? Like "Please", "spleen", "Kleenex"?

[GoesStation]

"It follows..."? Like "Please", "spleen", "Kleenex"?

Yes.

[Kenneth's softneʔtɪʔkʼ]

OK. I rechecked out my paper-version grammar book and found "l" is a voiced consonant.

I was wondering why you came up with such a question about 'semi-vowel vs consonant'.
I'm more interested in finding the reason behind it.

And yes, in technical terms, /l/ in English is a voiced alveolar lateral approximant, as in live, life, let, laugh, lack, look, lock. In this case, it is nicknamed 'clear l'.

In word-final positions or after a vowel, /l/ is so 'velarised' that the root of the tongue retracts and raises to the soft palate (aka velum), in which you would pronounce this 'dark l' in such words as cool, rule, cold, aisle, smell.


In some environments, /l/ tends to devoice and sounds like this kind of /l/ after /s/, as we have slow, sled, sleek, slam. This is also true when /l/ is preceded by other voiceless fricatives such as /f/ and /θ/.

Following voiceless plosives such as /k/ and /p/, this voiced approximant transforms to a voiceless fricative, when it falls on a stressed syllable. Falling on an unstressed syllable, 'clear l' is partially devoiced, similar to the case in which /l/ comes after a voiceless fricative.

I hope it could help with anything.


===Supplementary Information on Phonetic Symbols===

Allophonic members of /l/ as illustrated above:

The voiced alveolar lateral approximant is the typical [l]
Phoneme /l/ with velarisation or velarised /l/ or 'dark l' is denoted by [ɫ], called the small letter L with tilde.
Partially devoiced /l/ makes [l̥] - with a small circle under it
Fully deviced /l/ turns out to be voiceless alveolar lateral fricative [ɬ], the symbol name of which is the small letter L with belt.

Another useful symbol is the syllabric /l/ expressed as [ɫ̩] in narrow phonetic transcription.

[Kenneth's softneʔtɪʔkʼ]

It isn't 'nicknamed' clear l. That's what it's called.

Thanks for correcting me, Piscean the typoman.

Let me put it this way.

The superimposed tilde symbol ~ on the small letter L resembles some clouds and when it's taken away, it's no longer in darkness.

Strictly speaking, the meaning of 'dark' form the perspective of etymology is related to 'conceal' or 'obscure'.

The typical quality of /l/ is concealed - by adding velarisaton to the alveolar-like sound. This might be the origin of 'clear' vs 'dark' in the use of phonetic terminology here.

Incidentally, [l] in English phonology can be formally named voiced alveolar lateral approximant.

Do you mean that /l/ in 'clan' is a voiceless fricative? That's a novel idea.

Take clan, clean, cleat, clot, clay, inclined as examples.

Yes, in some utterances, /l/, when fully devoiced, is realised as [ɬ].
Simply put, if the effect of plosion (i.e. exploding the air out of your month) is long and strong enough to migrate to the next segment of speech sound, [l] will further assimilate to [ɬ], losing its voicing quality to a complete degree.

The realisation of /l/ in the case of [ɬ] varies from speaker to speaker. It is observable in casual, colloquial or connected speech.

When said in isolation or pronounced in a well-defined manner, /l/ can partially devoice to [l̥], retaining some voicing quality in the later part of that segment.

What do you mean by 'when it falls on a stressed syllable'.

When the syllable which contains /p/ followed by /l/ is stressed or accented, as in please, but not in implant /ˈɪmplɑːnt/ (as a noun) or /ˈkɒmplɪment/, /ˈkɒmplɪmənt/ complement (as a verb or a noun) .

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No offence intended in any of the replies.

[Kenneth's softneʔtɪʔkʼ]

I see little resemblance to clouds here:[ɬ]

Pardon me? [ɫ] 😉

That symbol, the 'belted' l', [ɬ] is the symbol for the voiceless alveolar lateral fricative that exists in Welsh, but not in the English of most speakers in England. The velarised alveolar lateral approximant or 'dark l', has the /l/ with the tilde: [ɬ]

This is a tilde ~

and hence [ɫ]


That's correct. The voiceless alveolar lateral fricative is a phoneme in Welsh, whereas it is not regarded as a phoneme in RP.

<ll> is a digraph for [ɬ] in Welsh. 😉
You may know the longest name of a town in Wales starts with this speech sound.

Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrob

Likewise, [ɦ] and [ç] are allophones of [h] in English and they can be a phoneme in other languages. Much to one's surprise, the velar ejective also exists in English.

Some allophones do confuse learners of English, or even those having teaching experience. Some certain allophones are not recommended to learners as they might be told the manifestation is wrong.

Please note that a phoneme notated by a particular symbol representing one of the meaningful units of speech sound is not comparable across languages, despite being expressed as the same notation.

And an allophone of one language should not be directly referred to as another speech sound existing in another language, which might be a phoneme or a allophone of that language.

Due regard should be had to treatment of concepts and notation of phonetics and a related discipline - phonology. Thank you.

[Kenneth's softneʔtɪʔkʼ]

I don't see what this has to do with the subject of this thread.

It is an extension to what Mr/Miss Piscean pinpointed.
Sorry for misleading the flow of the thread to some related phonetic concepts. Deepest apologies. Oops... rong collocation here. My profuse apologies.

[Kenneth's softneʔtɪʔkʼ]

Do you mean that /l/ in 'clan' is a voiceless fricative? That's a novel idea.

From Wikipedia

Fortition also frequently occurs with voiceless versions of the common lateral approximant [l], usually sourced from combinations of [l] with a voiceless obstruent. The product is a voiceless alveolar lateral fricative [ɬ].
(emphasis mine)

The allophone does exist, if one takes phonological process into account.

[GoesStation]

As I said in post 12, "the 'belted' l', [ɬ] is the symbol for the voiceless alveolar lateral fricative that exists in Welsh, but not in the English of most speakers in England".

It's a phoneme in the Navajo language. A British anthropologist who encountered the Navajo in the nineteenth century reported that they spoke Welsh, presumably because he heard that phoneme.