In today's world, L is a topic that has become increasingly relevant. Over the years, L has generated great interest in society, sparking debates, research and different positions around this issue. It is evident that L has impacted our lives in some way, whether on a social, cultural, economic or personal level. For this reason, it is important to thoroughly analyze and understand the implications and consequences that L brings with it, as well as to be aware of the trends and advances that are developing in relation to this topic. In this article we will explore various perspectives and approaches on L, with the aim of providing a complete and enriching overview that allows the reader to delve deeper into this topic.
12th letter of the Latin alphabet
This article is about the letter of the alphabet. For other uses, see L (disambiguation).
L, or l, is the twelfth letter of the Latin alphabet, used in the modern English alphabet, the alphabets of other western European languages and others worldwide. Its name in English is el (pronounced /ˈɛl/EL), plural els.
In most sans-serif typefaces, the lowercase letter ell⟨l⟩, written l, may be difficult to distinguish from the uppercase letter "eye" ⟨I⟩; in some serif typefaces, the glyphl may be confused with the glyph 1, the digit one. To avoid such confusion, some newer computer fonts (such as Trebuchet MS) have a finial, a curve to the right at the bottom of the lowercase letter ell.
Another means of reducing such confusion is to use symbol ℓ, which is a cursive, handwriting-style lowercase form of the letter "ell"; this form is seen in European road signs and advertisements. In Japan, for example, this is the symbol for the liter. (The International Committee for Weights and Measures recommends using L or l for the liter, without specifying a typeface.) In Unicode, the cursive form is encoded as U+2113ℓSCRIPT SMALL L from the "letter-like symbols" block. Unicode encodes an explicit symbol as U+1D4C1𝓁MATHEMATICAL SCRIPT SMALL L. The TeX syntax <math>\ell</math> renders it as . In mathematical formulas, an italic form (ℓ) of the script ℓ is the norm.
Sometimes seen in Web typography, a serif font for the lowercase letter ell, such as l, in otherwise sans-serif text was used.
In the blackletter type used in England until the seventeenth century, the letter L is rendered as .
In English orthography, ⟨l⟩ usually represents the phoneme /l/, which can have several sound values, depending on the speaker's accent, and whether it occurs before or after a vowel. In Received Pronunciation, the alveolar lateral approximant (the sound represented in IPA by lowercase ) occurs before a vowel, as in lip or blend, while the velarized alveolar lateral approximant (IPA ) occurs in bell and milk. This velarization does not occur in many European languages that use ⟨l⟩; it is also a factor making the pronunciation of ⟨l⟩ difficult for users of languages that lack ⟨l⟩ or have different values for it, such as Japanese or some southern dialects of Chinese. A medical condition or speech impediment restricting the pronunciation of ⟨l⟩ is known as lambdacism.
In English orthography, ⟨l⟩ is often silent in such words as walk or could (though its presence can modify the preceding vowel letter's value), and it is usually silent in such words as palm and psalm; however, there is some regional variation. L is the eleventh most frequently used letter in the English language.
Common digraphs include ⟨ll⟩, which has a value identical to ⟨l⟩ in English, but has the separate value voiceless alveolar lateral fricative (IPA ) in Welsh, where it can appear in an initial position. In Spanish, ⟨ll⟩ represents /ʎ/ (, , , , or , depending on dialect).
The capital letter L is used as the currency sign for the Albanian lek and the Honduran lempira. It was often used, especially in handwriting, as the currency sign for the Italian lira. Historically, it was commonly used as a currency sign for the British pound sterling (to abbreviate the Latin libra, a pound, see £sd); in modern usage it has been overtaken by the pound sign (£), which is based on the blackletter form of the letter. In running text, its lower-case form (usually italicised), l, was more often seen.
Uralic Phonetic Alphabet-specific symbols related to L:U+1D0CᴌLATIN LETTER SMALL CAPITAL L WITH STROKE and U+1D38ᴸMODIFIER LETTER CAPITAL L
ₗ : Subscript small l was used in the Uralic Phonetic Alphabet prior to its formal standardization in 1902
ȴ : L with curl is used in Sino-Tibetanist linguistics
Ꞁ ꞁ : Turned L was used by William Pryce to designate the Welsh voiced lateral spirant The lower case is also used in the Romic alphabet. In Unicode, these are U+A780ꞀLATIN CAPITAL LETTER TURNED L, and U+A781ꞁLATIN SMALL LETTER TURNED L.
^For example, see the Diary of Samuel Pepys for 31December 1661: " I suppose myself to be worth about 500l. clear in the world, ..."
References
^"L" Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd edition (1989) Merriam-Webster's Third New International Dictionary of the English Language, Unabridged. (1993); "el", "ells", op. cit.
^ ab"The International System of Units (SI) | The SI brochure, 9th edition, 2019"(PDF). December 2022. Retrieved 23 July 2023. The litre, and the symbol lower-case l, were adopted by the CIPM in 1879 (PV, 1879, 41). The alternative symbol, capital L, was adopted by the 16th CGPM (1979, Resolution 6; CR, 101 and Metrologia, 1980, 16, 56-57) in order to avoid the risk of confusion between the letter l (el) and the numeral 1 (one).
^Dowding, Geoffrey (1962). An introduction to the history of printing types; an illustrated summary of main stages in the development of type design from 1440 up to the present day: an aid to type face identification. Clerkenwell : Wace. p. 5.
^"Foire aux questions sur l'horlogerie et les montres" [Frequently asked questions about watches and clocks]. horlogerie-suisse.com (in French). Archived from the original on 2022-01-21. Retrieved 2022-01-18. Par tradition ancestrale, les horlogers n'utilisent pas le millimètre mais la ligne pour désigner le diamètre d'encageage d'un mouvement. [By ancestral tradition, watchmakers do not use the millimeter but the line to designate the casing diameter of a movement]
^H. P. Lehmann, X. Fuentes-Arderiu, and L. F. Bertello (1996): "Glossary of terms in quantities and units in Clinical Chemistry (IUPAC-IFCC Recommendations 1996)"; page 963, item "Avogadro constant". Pure and Applied Chemistry, volume 68, issue 4, pages 957–1000. doi:10.1351/pac199668040957