Pronounce song and son?

Question

What's the Pronunciation difference between song and son?

CharmYou · Accepted Answer

CharmYou What's the Pronunciation difference between song and son?

Raindoctor · Answer

There is a vowel difference, along with the final nasal.

The word 'song' falls in the CLOTH lexical set, whereas 'son' falls in the STRUT lexical set. You pronounciation of 'song' rhymes with 'sung'. Even the vowel of your 'son' is off. To me, it appears a bit higher and backer than the citation form vowel of 'son', which is lower than the schwa (the center of the vowel space).

Since you are using audio, I don't recommend calling 'ng' sound, just produce the sound. Try to produce /?/ and /?g/, then learn to perceive the difference, which has to do with velum movement. It is like the difference between /n/ and /nd/. Sure, describing is different from doing it. Some times, descriptions function as mental images, which help you produce these sounds. Once you learn to discriminate fine distinction between sounds, then you can incorporate the timing distinction.

CharmYou · Answer

Thanks a lot.

Blue Jay · Answer

Yes, "song" and "sun". Here are two links for audio pronunciation guides.
http://dictionary.cambridge.org/

http://www.forvo.com/

CalifJim · Answer

CharmYousong and son

Just be sure you know that the so-called "ng" sound is not the same as an "n" sound connected to a "g" sound.

There are three different sounds involved. "n", "g", and "ng"( [n], [g], [?] ), and there is no [g] in either word.

[sa?] [s?n]

The "ng" sound [?] is about the same as an "n" sound [n] except your tongue doesn't touch the roof of your mouth and the back of your tongue is drawn backwards to make the [?]. In fact, it's drawn back to about the position where you would put it to make a [g], except you're not saying a [g].

CJ

Pronounce song and son?

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