lateral fricative (was: Láadan and woman's speak)

At 2:18 pm -0500 21/5/00, Matt Pearson wrote:
>Ray Brown wrote:
>
>>Herman Miller replied:
>>>I've always liked the sound of lateral fricatives. I used a voiceless
>>>*palatal* lateral fricative in one of my Elvish languages.
>>
>>To which at 2:01 pm -0500 20/5/00, Matt Pearson replied:
>>>Tokana also has this sound.  Actually, it's more of a postalveolar
>>>lateral fricative (same point of articulation as English /S/).
>>
>>That's the Welsh "ll" which I've also heard in Zulu & Xhosa (two of the
>>Nguni languages).  But I think that Herman is saying he also used a palatal
>>variety, not that the Welsh one is palatal (which it most certainly isn't).
>
>>From what I've been able to determine, the Welsh/Zulu voiceless
>lateral fricative is alveolar and apical (closure made at or near
>the tip of the tongue, like /l/).
I remember a thread on this a year or so back when Mark Line was involved.
The Welsh _ll_ is certainly not made with the tongue in the same position
as I have it for /l/.  For the latter sound my tongue is definitely central
with gaps on both sides for air to pass round; where the tip of the tongue
is depends whether I'm pronouncing a 'light l' as in 'leaf' or 'dark l' as
in 'field'.

But the Welsh /K/ is never made with the tongue in that position; it is
always pressed against one side of the mouth, i.e. a laminal, not an
apical, sound.  But according to Mark, many people do this when pronouncing
the English /l/ and there is, according to him, no significant difference
between the /l/ they produce and the /l/ I produce.

>The Tokana voiceless lateral
>is *post*alveolar and laminal (closure made with the body of
>the tongue).
Closure is also made with the body of the tongue in saying the Welsh
voiceless lateral which, as I noted above, is thus also laminal. Whether
the body of the tongue is pressed against the right or left side is not
important - FWIW my tongue is always pressed against the left side - and
air is forced out through the opposite side, hence the friction.  It sounds
IMO more like someone with a speech defect trying to say /S/ or /s/, rather
than any _l_ sound.

Indeed, your description above and what you wrote on 20th May:
"Tokana also has this sound.  Actually, it's more of a postalveolar lateral
fricative (same point of articulation as English /S/)"
- suggest very strongly to me that the Tokana lateral fricative is
essentially the same as the Welsh one.

I feel I can hold forth with some authority regarding the Welsh sound - I
learnt the sound in Wales itself some 30 years ago, where I lived for 22
years.  But I cannot speak for the Nguni (Zulu, Xhosa, Ndebele) lateral
fricatives the same way.  You may well be right about them; the only thing
I can say is that when I stayed at the Cape about 2 and half years ago, the
Xhosa {hl} sounded to me very similar, if not the same, as the Welsh sound;
but I could be mistaken about that.

Ray.



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A mind which thinks at its own expense
will always interfere with language.
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