Why there is no G in 'NG' | American English

Hey guys, it's Hadar, and this is the Accent's Way.

And today we're gonna talk about the N-G consonant sound.

Ng, what was that?

Let's try it again, ng.

Yes, it's a sound that is usually represented

with the consonant letters N and G.

So a word like sing is not singu.

There is no N, and then a gu sound.

Singu, no.

It is one consonant that is produced

in the back of the mouth, sing, sing.

Long, playing, okay?

So how do you make this sound?

Basically, the N-G is a combination

of the N sound, so it has that nasal quality

because the air is coming out through the nose,

but it has the placement of a G sound

because the back of the tongue goes

up and blocks the air in the back

while touching the soft pallet.

Gu, ng.

So to make this sound, the tongue goes

up in the back, blocks the air,

then you release the air through

the nasal passages and the air comes out through the nose.

Ng.

So when you open your mouth, you can see

that the tongue is totally down.

Another way to think about it is try

to make an N while keeping the tip

of the tongue down.

What you're gonna do is probably compensate

for the fact that you can bring

the tip of the tongue up, so you're gonna bring

the back of the tongue up.

Ng.

Sing, wrong.

Now again, because of the representation

of the G in the spelling, a lot of people pop

the gu sound at the end of the word.

Longingu, singingu.

When in fact these are all N-G consonants.

Singing, longing, and ping.

Now, what's the best way to practice it?

First of all, practice making the sound.

Ng, ng, all right?

So great, you got the sound right.

Then practice it in typical positions

where you're more likely to produce it with a gu sound.

Singu, ah-ah.

Sing.

Writingu, not right.

Writing, so you want to stretch

and hold out the N-G sound and then fade it out nicely

until you don't hear any more sounds.

Don't pop a G at the end.

Writing.

And long.

And step number three is to use it in minimal pairs.

So compare words that end with an N

to words that end with an N-G.

Sin versus sing.

Ran versus rang.

Lawn versus long.

All right, good job.

Okay, so that's it, thank you for watching.

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in the next video.

Bye.