Re: Phonetic question

necoandjeff wrote:
> "Dan Rempel" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
> news:[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>
>
> > > I'm no linguist but here are the rules I can think of:
> > >
> > > 1. Nouns that end in nger (finger, hunger, anger) are pronounced with a
>
> hard
>
> > > g.
> > >
> > > 2. Verbs that end in ng (which is always nasalized) maintain the
> > > nasalization when adding er to the end to convert it to a noun
>
> representing
>
> > > someone who or something that engages in the verb action (singer,
>
> banger,
>
> > > hanger, ringer).
> > >
> > > 3. Adjectives that end in ng (which is always nasalized) are converted
>
> to a
>
> > > hard g (younger, longer) when adding er to form the comparative.
> > >
> > > Now, let the exceptions rip. Anybody?
> >
> > Not an exception, but an observation: I think you're confusing spelling
> > and pronunciation. Singer is /sing-er/ (ng = velar nasal);  finger is
> > /fing-ger/. Does that make sense?
>
>
> I don't follow your point at all. What I've tried to do above is craft
> pronunciation rules regarding when the g in the nasalized "ng" also doubles
> as as a hard g. The word finger, for example, has a nasalized ng and the g
> also doubles as a hard g independently of that. In the word "singer,"
> however, this is not the case because there is (for most speakers) no hard g
> in that word.

If we use N for the velar nasal (as in /siNr/) and save g for the usual
voiced velar stop my point is (I hope) easier to see. The word singer
has no /g/ (at least in my dialect; Paul Blay says he pronounces it
something like /siNgr/); it's just /siNr/, one segment, and the g is an
artifact of the spelling. OTOH finger is pronounced /fiNgr/: there's two
segments, a nasal and a /g/.

> But in the word "younger," although the stem, "young," is
> pronounced with a nasalized "ng" just like the stem "sing" of "singer,"
> adding the "er" causes the g to double as a hard g. My suggestion in rules 2
> and 3 above is that this is because one is a verb and the other an
> adjective. I can't think of any exceptions to this rule but I invite others
> to try.

Yeah, I don't have an explanation for the /g/ in younger; maybe the
spelling is representing an older pronunciation, in which the /g/ was
always pronounced, and the /n/ was velarized by assimilation, and we've
just lost many of the actual /g/ segments over time.

Dan