All right

Question

When you say "all right", you never should connect /l/ in "all" and /i/ in "right" like /li/, right?

The tip of you tongue touches the area behind your upper teeth when you're saying /l/, and drops and tenses when you say /r/, right?

(If you have a video for learning to say "All right" please tell me?)

Thanks.

Avangi · Accepted Answer

Correct. There's a lot that needs to happen between the "l" and the "i."

To get the transition from the "l" to the "r," try saying "learn" slowly, as a three-syllable word. Really dwell on the "r" sound.

I'd say there are six extremely different sounds in "all right." The dipthong "i" begins with the wide-open "ah" as in singing "A-men."

(1) AW (2) LL (3) RR (4) AH (5) EE (6) TT

It's actually possible to transition from (1) to (2) by moving only the tongue, but we usually close the jaw a bit.

We close the jaw a little bit more in transitioning from (2) to (3), and, as you say, the tongue pulls away from it's "LL" position (touching the top front teeth at the gum line) and jams between the top back teeth (not touching the roof of the mouth), leaving the tip of the tongue comfortably in the middle.

In transitioning from (3) to (4) we simply open the mouth wide (wider than (1)) with the tongue comfortably resting between the bottom teeth.

The point is that it's completely impossible to go directly from (2) to (4). In (2), only the tip of the tongue touches the teeth. The back of the tongue is low, between the bottom teeth. So the back of the tongue must take a rather violent trip upward, to jam against the top back teeth (for the RR) before dropping back down again for the "AH."

To get the essence of this, keep repeating "learn," paying close attention to what's happening to the very back of your tongue. That's why you can't connect the "l" and the "i."

Edit. I notice that it's possible to pronounce "l" with the back of your tongue between your top teeth, but it's really not natural. The back of the tongue is certainly not forced between the lower teeth when pronouncing "l" - just resting comfortably.

- A.

Liveinjapan · Answer

"All right!"

Thanks, Avangi.

Kooyeen · Answer

I have seen your threads about L.
Well, I have to say the tip of my tongue doesn't touch behind the teeth in many cases! I guess many of my L's are... maybe I have seen the IPA symbol somewhere... maybe they are ?? When I say "alright", my tongue doesn't touch anything. It only moves up for the final T.

EDIT: Wait, maybe it's this one instead: ?...But I am not an expert, LOL. And I am not even a native speaker.

RE-EDIT: Yes, after checking on the net, it seems what I meant is more like ?, but the true quality of the sound seems very difficult to point out. It's definitely different from initial L's (as in "loop").

Avangi · Answer

Were you addressing I? (We both mentioned the tip of the tongue and the teeth!)

When I'm angry (Alright! Let's quiet down!) I skip the "L" altogether: "Auright!"

But I completely agree with you. In casual speech I just swipe anywhere ahead of the roof of my mouth.

So let's say you skip the "L." do you skip the "R" as well? I don't see how you can make an "rr" sound without touching the back of your tongue to your upper molars.

That doesn't leave much of "alright," except "aht."

I confess I'm inclined to think in terms of singing, so the diction tends to come out a little differently.

Glad you joined in on this! - A.

Kooyeen · Answer

Hi,
it's not that I skip the L completely, it's just that it's a different kind of L, at least for me, which seems to be something closer to /?/ (that's the IPA symbol). It's like a normal "dark L", but the tip of the tongue doesn't go up all the way to the roof of the mouth, behind the teeth. I wouldn't know how to explain it.
What I know is that if I say "Alright, let's go", the L in "alright" and the one in "let's" are different. To say "let's", my tongue needs to touch the roof of my mouth behind the teeth, but to say "alright", it doesn't. And on second thought, I guess it wouldn't be able to, and when said casually it sounds like it's missing completely: aw-right! Another similar word would be "milk": I can say it either touching or not touching, and both would sound acceptable.
Come to think of it, I think I sometimes have that different L at the end of words too, in "cool", "pool", etc. Maybe it's just me, or it's a dialectal feature I picked up somewhere, somehow.

Avangi · Answer

I thoroughly get your point about initial L being radically different, or special. But I think "miwk" is simply a good case of bad diction.

"Coo" is okay, but "poo" is treading on dangerous ground. "I think I'll go wade in the poo."

Liveinjapan · Answer

Kooyeen "milk":

Thanks, Kooyeen and Avangi!

Is /l/ in milk a silent /l/? Could be either?

If you have time could you join in talk/walk I posted here? All of them have /l/ in the second position to the last word.

Avangi · Answer

None of the "L's" in this post are silent.

When the "L" is the first letter, it's stronger than when it appears mid-word. The tip of the tongue is definitely against the top teeth. Some people even have a bad habit of dwelling on it.

Kooyeen and I were debating about the action of the tongue in pronouncing mid-word "L's." His position is that the tip of the tongue need not touch the roof of the mouth at all. My position is that such "L's" are practically silent and result in bad diction.

The "L's" in walk and talk are deliberately silent.

Liveinjapan · Answer

AvangiThe "L's" in walk and talk are deliberately silent.

Thanks, Avangi.

When I say talk/walk, the tip of my tongue doesn't touch the area behind my upper teeth, but you mean it's OK?

CalifJim · Answer

LiveinjapanWhen you say "all right"

I do not pronounce an L in "all right" or in "always".

I say "aurite", "auwiz"

CJ

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