# All languages, nasals before /k/ and /g/



## Ben Jamin

Does anyone know if the pronunciation of a dental nasal /n/*occurs in any European language before /k/ or /g/, for instance in a word like bank/banco?
* I know that dental nasal may be an inaccurate term but I mean basically a sound opposed to a velar /ŋ/, which is, as I suppose, most common.


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## ancalimon

It happens in Turkish.


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## Ben Jamin

ancalimon said:


> It happens in Turkish.



Is this a standard pronunciation?


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## ancalimon

Yes that's standard in Turkish..  For example when you say Ankara, the "n" is nasal. It's as if NK is a separate letter.


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## Ригель

It occurs in Russian. The letter combinations -нг- and -нк- are fairly rare but the nasal is pronounced as dental/alveolar /ng/ and /nk/ respectively, not a velar /ŋg/ or /ŋk/, for instance in the words а*нг*лийский or ве*нг*ерский. Here's a thread about the same topic in the Russian forum.


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## Ben Jamin

ancalimon said:


> Yes that's standard in Turkish..  For example when you say Ankara, the "n" is nasal. It's as if NK is a separate letter.


I think that there is a misunderstanding. An N is always nasal. A "fusion" of N and G, like in "singing" (the last two letters) is called "velar" N.


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## Ben Jamin

Ригель said:


> It occurs in Russian. The letter combinations -нг- and -нк- are fairly rare but the nasal is pronounced as dental/alveolar /ng/ and /nk/ respectively, not a velar /ŋg/ or /ŋk/, for instance in the words а*нг*лийский or ве*нг*ерский. Here's a thread about the same topic in the Russian forum.


Is the pronunciation the same before a K, and at the end of the word, like in "bank"?


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## Ригель

Ben Jamin said:


> Is the pronunciation the same before a K, and at the end of the word, like in "bank"?



Yes, it should be /bank/, not /baŋk/. There are some words though that can be pronounced with the velar nasal but typically that is not the case. Here's a quote from wiki: 

Russian has the rare feature of nasals not typically being assimilated in place of articulation. Both /n/ and /nʲ/ appear before retroflex consonants: деньжонки [dʲɪnʲˈʐonkʲɪ] ('money' (scornful)) and ханжой [xɐnˈʐoj] ('hypocrite' instr.). In the same context, other coronal consonants are always hard. A partial exception to this is the velar nasal, which occurs as an allophone before velar consonants in some words (функция [ˈfuŋk.t͡sɨjə] 'function'), but not in most other words like банк [bank] ('bank').


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## Ben Jamin

Ригель said:


> Yes, it should be /bank/, not /baŋk/. There are some words though that can be pronounced with the velar nasal but typically that is not the case. Here's a quote from wiki:
> 
> Russian has the rare feature of nasals not typically being assimilated in place of articulation. Both /n/ and /nʲ/ appear before retroflex consonants: деньжонки [dʲɪnʲˈʐonkʲɪ] ('money' (scornful)) and ханжой [xɐnˈʐoj] ('hypocrite' instr.). In the same context, other coronal consonants are always hard. A partial exception to this is the velar nasal, which occurs as an allophone before velar consonants in some words (функция [ˈfuŋk.t͡sɨjə] 'function'), but not in most other words like банк [bank] ('bank').


Thank you! It was very informative!


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## fdb

German has [ŋg] in “Anglist”, but [ng] in “angeben”. There must be some rule about morpheme bounderies.


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## Ben Jamin

fdb said:


> German has [ŋg] in “Anglist”, but [ng] in “angeben”. There must be some rule about morpheme bounderies.


I have a couple of questions regarding your post:

1. What element makes it easier to separate the two phonemes from each other: is there a micropause between the prefix and the root that prevents merging, or is it the intonation / stress that does the trick?
2. Is this pronunciation kept in all kinds of speech, or only in careful diction?


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## Roy776

Ben Jamin said:


> I have a couple of questions regarding your post:
> 
> 1. What element makes it easier to separate the two phonemes from each other: is there a micropause between the prefix and the root that prevents merging, or is it the intonation / stress that does the trick?
> 2. Is this pronunciation kept in all kinds of speech, or only in careful diction?



1. There is a really short pause between N and G but really very short.
2. It's kept in all registers.  The reason for this being so is that 'angeben' is formed by adding a prefix to a stem. 'An' as the prefix and 'geben' as the stem. Usually, nk and ng are pronounced with a velar n.

I've seen the thread about the word 'bank' in the Polish forum, and in German it's definitely 'baŋk'. I have to force myself to say 'bank', it definitely sounds unnatural (in German).


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## fdb

“Anglist” is of course a Latinism. A better example might be “Anker” [ŋk] versus “Anklage” [nk].


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## Dan2

fdb said:


> German has [ŋg] in “Anglist”, but [ng] in “angeben”.  There must be some rule about morpheme bounderies.


Something similar in English: "mankiller" [n] vs. "Mankowitz" [ŋ] (but see below).


Ben Jamin said:


> 1. What element makes it easier to  separate the two phonemes from each other: is there a micropause between  the prefix and the root that prevents merging, or is it the intonation /  stress that does the trick?


In the case of "mankiller" (or "mankind") I don't think there's any pause.  I think "man" is simply an established word, ending in /n/, that resists modification.

But I do think stress is relevant.  For ex., I would normally stress the name Mankowitz (or Mankowicz) on the first syllable (sorry, Ben Jamin...),  but if you told me to stress the second, I would say [mæn]KOwitz.  Similarly "incur" [n] (stress is on second syllable) vs "inker" (device that inks) [ŋ].


Ben Jamin said:


> 2. Is this pronunciation kept in all kinds of speech, or only in careful diction?


I think "incur" requires fairly careful speech to maintain the [n].  For "mankiller", you'd have to be speaking in a very hurried fashion to get a [ŋ].


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## myšlenka

Dan2 said:


> Something similar in English: "mankiller" [n] vs. "Mankowitz" [ŋ] (but see below).
> 
> In the case of "mankiller" (or "mankind") I don't think there's any pause.  I think "man" is simply an established word, ending in /n/, that resists modification.


I have taken a course in English phonetics (taught by an American) where it was said that words like _handbag_ would often be pronounced ['hæmbæg].


> But I do think stress is relevant.  For ex., I would normally stress the name Mankowitz (or Mankowicz) on the first syllable (sorry, Ben Jamin...),  but if you told me to stress the second, I would say [mæn]KOwitz.  Similarly "incur" [n] (stress is on second syllable) vs "inker" (device that inks) [ŋ].


Are you sure about this? You are describing a phonological system where contrast is preserved in non-tonic positions while it is neutralized in tonic positions.


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## Dan2

myšlenka said:


> I have taken a course in English phonetics (taught by an American) where it was said that words like _handbag_ would often be pronounced ['hæmbæg].


Nice example (first the /d/ has to be lost, putting the /n/ in contact with the /b/).

I don't see any contradiction here; my post and your phonetics course are just approaching similar facts from opposite directions.  The OP set the tone for the discussion in this thread by asking if [nk] _ever_ occurs.  My answer: yes, for ex. in "mankiller".  I went on to acknowledge that in "hurried speech" the /n/ could assimilate.

Your phonetics professor came at this from the other direction: "A word like "handbag" appears to have /ndb/, but - believe it or not - that /ndb/ is "often pronounced" [mb]."  I agree.

Is his "often pronounced" equivalent to my "in hurried speech"?  That's a difficult judgment.  There are actually two differences between "mankiller" and "handbag".  "handbag" is a much commoner word, and as a result we are more likely to go ahead with natural phonetic modifications to the "base" form.  Also, there is the assimilation of /n/ to /b/ as opposed to to /k/.

Certainly we _perceive_ "mankiller" and "handbag" to have /n/, and _can pronounce_ these words in a natural fashion with [n].  That contrasts sharply with "ink" and "bank", which we perceive of as having [ŋ] and which cannot be pronounced with [n].  That alone is a significant response to the OP's question.



myšlenka said:


> Dan2 said:
> 
> 
> 
> Similarly "incur" [n] (stress is on second syllable) vs "inker" (device that inks) [ŋ].
> 
> 
> 
> Are you sure about this?
Click to expand...

The example of "incur" was based on my intuition, but I've checked and dictionaries are in agreement.  For "incur", as well as more frequent words like "ingredient" and "congratulate" they show [n], while for "ink" and "Congo" they have [ŋ]


myšlenka said:


> You are describing a phonological system where contrast is preserved in non-tonic positions while it is neutralized in tonic positions.


Well the contrast certainly _exists_ in stressed position ("sin" vs "sing").  The question is, when does a base form undergo modification.  I think the relevant point is that dictionaries, for ex., divide a word like "incur" as "in-cur" but "inker" as "ink-er", and that _division_ is based on stress (stress "attracts consonants", in this case the /k/).  Once we have that division, the reason for assimilation only in the second case seems clear.


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## myšlenka

Dan2 said:


> In the case of "mankiller" (or "mankind") I don't think there's any pause. I think "man" is simply an established word, ending in /n/, that resists modification.





Dan2 said:


> I don't see any contradiction here; my post and your phonetics course are just approaching similar facts from opposite directions. The OP set the tone for the discussion in this thread by asking if [nk] _ever_ occurs. My answer: yes, for ex. in "mankiller". I went on to acknowledge that in "hurried speech" the /n/ could assimilate.


I misread your post a little. I thought you said that the /n/ in _man_ would never assimilate and I tried to make a parallell with ['hæmbæg] where it does assimilate.


> Is his "often pronounced" equivalent to my "in hurried speech"?


The term she used was "features of connected speech".


> Certainly we _perceive_ "mankiller" and "handbag" to have /n/, and _can pronounce_ these words in a natural fashion with [n]. That contrasts sharply with "ink" and "bank", which we perceive of as having [ŋ] and which cannot be pronounced with [n]. That alone is a significant response to the OP's question.


I understand Ben Jamin's question differently. I think he is asking for languages where the lack of assimilation occurs _obligatorily _or for languages where there is a phonological contrast between [nk] and [ŋk]. The assimilation patterns found in English are very very common.


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## Ben Jamin

myšlenka said:


> I misread your post a little. I thought you said that the /n/ in _man_ would never assimilate and I tried to make a parallell with ['hæmbæg] where it does assimilate.
> 
> The term she used was "features of connected speech".
> 
> I understand Ben Jamin's question differently. I think he is asking for languages where the lack of assimilation occurs _obligatorily _or for languages where there is a phonological contrast between [nk] and [ŋk]. The assimilation patterns found in English are very very common.



Yes, you have perceived the question correctly. English is actually not the issue here, least there is a dialect in which a dental n occurs before k. 
I am, however, interested if there are words in Norwegian that follow the German pattern of no assimilation of the prefix final N to the following K. What about the word "anklage"?


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## myšlenka

Ben Jamin said:


> I am, however, interested if there are words in Norwegian that follow the German pattern of no assimilation of the prefix final N to the following K. What about the word "anklage"?


Both ['ɑnklɑ:gə] and ['ɑŋklɑ:gə] seem to be acceptable pronunciations of _anklage_ to me, but I prefer the one without assimilation.


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