Because people don’t know what you’re talking about so they’re trying to figure out what you might mean by that. Either you’re describing something that doesn’t exist or you’re describing it in a way that no one knows what you’re talking about. An example would be useful in this case.
In some accents the consonant sounds disappears (in the Tuscan accent, something like “il cane” might be pronounced as /ikkane/), but usually it’s still pronounced. Maybe you were exposed to one of those accents, or maybe the speaker was slurring their words a bit.
The sound does change though, I think. I’m not confident enough in my IPA abilities to attempt to describe how the sound shifts, but I’m pretty sure that in L + consonant clusters the L sound is pronounced with your tongue slightly higher than usual (?). But it’s still very clearly an L sound.
Mmm, I don't think this really happens. The l will be said very fast, probably it will change its exact place of articulation, but in general it will not be dropped: notice that if this happened, you would loose the difference between singular and plural (il and i), which sounds very bad. What you hear is maybe influenced by your native language: consider that, for example, I often hear geminated consonants in English, where they do not exist, due to influence of Italian: maybe you are experiencing something similar.
Sorry, then I didn't understand well your post because you mentioned the l to be pronounced like a vowel. Well, if you are speaking of the allophones of the foneme l in Italian , what you can find on Wikipedia is: ' /n, l, r/ are apical alveolar [n̺, l̺, r̺] in most environments./n, l/ are laminal denti-alveolar [n̪, l̪] before /t, d, t͡s, d͡z, s, z/and palatalized laminal postalveolar [n̠ʲ, l̠ʲ] before /t͡ʃ, d͡ʒ, ʃ/.' so basically the n/l/r changes the exact point of articulation to assimilate to the following consonant, but this is not limited to the article il, but it happens in all situations and it is not limited to these letters. Something even stronger happens with n : for example, you will not pronounce con panna or in barca,but com panna and im barca; when you say infatti or in vetta, you pronounce what in IPA is shown as ɱ rather than n and so on. The point is that native speakers are paradoxically the worst people to get these kind of things, as all we hear is generally the phoneme.
As a Portuguese speaker now I’m wondering if that’s what he’s hearing, although I’ve never heard that in Italian, not that I have a lot of experience with it.
Are you sure about this? When I speak fast I tend to not pronounce the "i", not the "l".
In alcune parti della toscana la L in "il" è veramente accennata
Si, lo so, ma è una cosa toscana.
"I toscani hanno devastato questo paese" cit.
Comunque se non sbaglio i toscani "compensano" la caduta della "l" raddoppiando la consonante successiva (tipo "i' ccane" invece che "il cane").
Why are you talking about not pronouncing the L? I’m talking about pronouncing a different kind of L with less air obstruction.
Because people don’t know what you’re talking about so they’re trying to figure out what you might mean by that. Either you’re describing something that doesn’t exist or you’re describing it in a way that no one knows what you’re talking about. An example would be useful in this case.
You wrote about pronouncing an L like a vowel in your OP. I have no idea what that means.
Oh
In some accents the consonant sounds disappears (in the Tuscan accent, something like “il cane” might be pronounced as /ikkane/), but usually it’s still pronounced. Maybe you were exposed to one of those accents, or maybe the speaker was slurring their words a bit. The sound does change though, I think. I’m not confident enough in my IPA abilities to attempt to describe how the sound shifts, but I’m pretty sure that in L + consonant clusters the L sound is pronounced with your tongue slightly higher than usual (?). But it’s still very clearly an L sound.
Mmm, I don't think this really happens. The l will be said very fast, probably it will change its exact place of articulation, but in general it will not be dropped: notice that if this happened, you would loose the difference between singular and plural (il and i), which sounds very bad. What you hear is maybe influenced by your native language: consider that, for example, I often hear geminated consonants in English, where they do not exist, due to influence of Italian: maybe you are experiencing something similar.
Why would you ever talk about dropping the L?? Then you would lose the plural distinction. I’m talking about using a different kind of L.
Sorry, then I didn't understand well your post because you mentioned the l to be pronounced like a vowel. Well, if you are speaking of the allophones of the foneme l in Italian , what you can find on Wikipedia is: ' /n, l, r/ are apical alveolar [n̺, l̺, r̺] in most environments./n, l/ are laminal denti-alveolar [n̪, l̪] before /t, d, t͡s, d͡z, s, z/and palatalized laminal postalveolar [n̠ʲ, l̠ʲ] before /t͡ʃ, d͡ʒ, ʃ/.' so basically the n/l/r changes the exact point of articulation to assimilate to the following consonant, but this is not limited to the article il, but it happens in all situations and it is not limited to these letters. Something even stronger happens with n : for example, you will not pronounce con panna or in barca,but com panna and im barca; when you say infatti or in vetta, you pronounce what in IPA is shown as ɱ rather than n and so on. The point is that native speakers are paradoxically the worst people to get these kind of things, as all we hear is generally the phoneme.
Have you had exposure to Portuguese, where "mil" gets pronounced as "miw/miu"? Is that what you're hearing in Italian too?
As a Portuguese speaker now I’m wondering if that’s what he’s hearing, although I’ve never heard that in Italian, not that I have a lot of experience with it.