An acoustic and articulatory study of /l/ allophony in Newfoundland English

This paper reports on an acoustic and articulatory study of /l/ in Newfoundland, Canada. English spoken in Irish-settled areas of the province is reported to exhibit light /l/ in all positions, in contrast to the standard North American English pattern with dark /l/ in codas and light /l/ in onsets. Our study reports on /l/ productions from 9 male and 13 female speakers from across the province. /l/ productions were elicited preceding and following word boundaries (e.g. steal assets vs. see lapses). Articulatory measures of tongue body height and retraction were determined using ultrasound imaging and F2-F1 values were used as an acoustic measure of /l/ darkness. As a group, participants show the standard North American pattern with significantly darker /l/s in word-final position. There is significant variation among speakers, however, with some speakers failing to show a distinction between final and initial /l/ in the acoustic or articulatory measures.