Dark L

 

Dark L

Some words with the letter “L” can be pretty tricky. Try to pronounce words like “feel” or “pool.” If you follow the light L pronunciation direction, the words will not sound right. To pronounce these words correctly, you need to do more with your tongue. In addition to the tip of the tongue being brought to the alveolar ridge, the back of the tongue should be raised toward the velum. That is, the back of the tongue should lift up slightly towards the soft palate as you make this sound, and you should feel a bit of tension in your throat and tongue. It is still back in the mouth, but there is a slight lift upward. In this way, the L sound comes from the back of the mouth, which sounds like /əl/. In other words, there is a little schwa sound in the dark L. This type of L sound is called the dark L or the velar L. Due to the schwa in the dark L, words with a dark L sound longer. When pronouncing “feel” and “pool,” we should say “fee+əl” and “poo+əl.” 

Dark L words

L letters that appear at the end of a word are often pronounced as dark L’s. These are words with dark L: 

real, deal, seal, heel, pool, tool, bowl, owl, wheel, hole, detail, mail, nail, tail

with “le”: 

apple, simple, ample, circle, cycle, bottle, cattle, kettle, little, muddle, couple, trouble, struggle, whole, puddle, muscle, whale, hole, title, mantle, saddle, poodle, ladle, able, responsible, trouble, capable, terrible, available, valuable, possible

with “el”: 

panel, tunnel, parcel, towel, kernel 

with “al”: 

petal, pedal, metal, hospital, medical, local, animal, maximal, abnormal

 

“l + consonant”: 

film, milk, help, wolf

“ll”:

pull, tall, ball, fall, will, all, call, shell, yell, bell, hill, wall, spell

Dark L sentences

These are sentences with dark L words:

That’s a good deal on a couple towels.

The small ball fell in the cool pool.

Pull the tall girl out from the puddle.

I will tell you all the details in the email.

‘Medal’ and ‘metal’ sound the same when Americans speak!