it also applies to words that end with "rd," for example with (farm) being pronounced . The uvular R has gained less acceptance in eastern regions, and linguists speculate that dialects that use retroflexes have a "natural defense" against uvular R and thus will not adopt it. However, the dialect of Arendal retains the retroflexes, while featuring the uvular R in remaining positions, e.g. . In large parts of Northern Norway, especially in the northern parts of Nordland county and southern parts of the former county of Troms, as well as several parts of the former county of Finnmark, another variant is still common: the voiced post-alveolar sibilant fricative . In front of voiceless consonants, the realisation of this R is unvoiced as well, to . Thus, where one in the southern and Trøndelag dialects will get or or , in areas realising voiced R as , one will get . Palatalization In areas north of an isogloss running between Oslo and Bergen, palatalization occurs for the n (IPA ), l (), t () and d () sounds in varying degrees. Areas just south and southwest of Trondheim palatalize both the main and subordinate syllable in words (e.g., ), but other areas only palatalize the main syllable (). Voicing of plosives Voiceless stops () have become voiced () intervocalically after long vowels (, vs. , ) on the extreme southern coast of Norway, including Kristiansand, Mandal and Stavanger. The same phenomenon appears in Sør-Trøndelag and one area in Nordland. Segmentation The geminate in southwestern Norway has become , while just east in southcentral Norwegian the final is lost, leaving . The same sequence has been palatalized in Northern Norway, leaving the palatal lateral . Assimilation The second consonant in the consonant clusters , , and has assimilated to the first across most of Norway, leaving , , and respectively. Western Norway, though not in Bergen, retains the cluster. In Northern Norway this same cluster is realized as the palatal lateral . Consonant shift in conjugation of masculine nouns Although used less frequently, a subtle shift takes place in conjugating a masculine noun from indefinitive to definitive, e.g., from to (, [beçːen] or ). This is found in rural dialects along the coast from Farsund to the border between Troms and Finnmark. The kj - sj merger Many people, especially in the younger generation, have lost the differentiation between the (written