The acquisition of the lateral fricative in Welsh-English bilinguals

This article reports on a study into the acquisition of Welsh phonology in bilingual Welsh-English children. It concentrates on the acquisition of the voiceless alveolar lateral fricative, which showed a wide range of substitutions, and differential patterns of development dependent on the dominant language of the subjects, and the position within the word of the target. Various substitution strategies are described, including fricatives, and fricatives plus lateral. It is noted that in these two categories, velar fricatives become increasingly common in later age ranges, especially with the English dominant speakers. It is argued that this is because, unlike front fricatives, the velar fricative shares several important acoustic characertistics with the lateral fricative: namely, a formant-like structure and the same top limit to the noise spectra.