Re: USAGE: pronouncing "l", "needs washed"

Nik Taylor
>
> And Rosta wrote:
> > I cannot see why that should have led to the restoration of
> > /l/. The pronunciations /wAk/ and /tAk/ aren't new to me; only
> > ones with /l/ in.
>
> Oh.  Well, probably just never lost it in the first place.
Do you have it in ba(u)lk, caulk, stalk too?

I don't have access to the Survey of English dialects to see if
the /l/ is preserved there in any dialects in England, and nor
do I have access to a history of Eng phonology that would date
the loss. The OED just gives the L-less pronunciation.

But at any rate, I think it far more likely that the /l/ was
reintroduced, for the reasons I gave in my earlier message,
than that it was not lost in the first place.

Corrections welcomed.

--And.