Missatges: 37
Llengua: English
Miland (Mostra el perfil) 25 de gener de 2011 15.00.05
Kiam N staras antaŭ gingiva aŭ vela sono, oni emas ŝanĝi N en gingivan sonon (malgranda diferenco), aŭ velan sonon (granda diferenco), por faciligi la elparolon: tranĉi, manĝi, longa, banko k.a. Tio estas senproblema, ĉar ne ekzistas gingiva aŭ vela nazaj sonoj, kun kiuj N povus konfuziĝi.
I translate freely:
"When N stands before a sound that uses the gum or soft palate, it may well be changed into a sound formed by using the gum (which makes only a small difference) or the soft palate (which makes a greater difference), in order to make pronunciation easier, e.g. in tranĉi, manĝi, longa, banko and others. That is not a problem, since there are no sounds formed using the gum or soft palate, with which N could be confused."
In short, as many have said, it doesn't matter how you pronounce n, so long as you don't drop the g altogether.
ceigered (Mostra el perfil) 25 de gener de 2011 15.07.53
Velarised/Uvularised N's (well, technically speaking that "ng" sound) seem to appear in every romance language before a hard g, definitely in every Germanic language, in most Chinese dialects, in Japanese, Indo-Malay, I'd expect some of the Slavic languages, quite a few African languages, many native languages (e.g. Kaurna ending -ngga, e.g. Tarndanyangga (at Tarndanya, "Adelaide" now)).
Well, that's my guess anyway. The wikipedia article on the matter suggests that while /ŋ/ is rare as a phoneme in some regions, it is allophonic of N before G/K.
So as far as international allophones go I reckon this one's as close to preferred as we can possibly get.
On a separate note, who votes that the Esperanto latin-inspired word "bovo" should be replaced with the Swahilian "ng'ombe"?
(mi nur ŝercas!) 
erinja (Mostra el perfil) 25 de gener de 2011 17.06.44
If Esperanto were a REAL world language, obviously it should also incorporate every alphabet from the world.
Obviously the new Esperanto should look something like this:
我 אוהב мояを ขาวを ძროხაを
darkweasel (Mostra el perfil) 25 de gener de 2011 17.11.24
pinto (Mostra el perfil) 25 de gener de 2011 18.16.39
pinto (Mostra el perfil) 25 de gener de 2011 18.26.34
Angvilo--Anguilla
estingkamiono--fire truck
estingkamiono seems really hard to me.
es-tin-g-ka-mi-o-no turns into either es-tin-guh-kah or es-tin-ka when I try to say it.
henma (Mostra el perfil) 25 de gener de 2011 18.30.22
pinto:I think what's also really interesting is so far I haven't seen any words that have the exact same problem as "lingvo".
"Lingvo" seems weird because the g is followed by the v which why it's so tempting to drop the g altogether. It falls in the same category to me as words like "knabo" which combines consanants in a way not typical for english speakers.That's true... it's a difficult word for spanish speakers too. In general, gv/kn/kv are difficult combinations, but with practice, you can pronounce them correctly.
If you practice enough, you can even pronounce lingvscienco without pausing after each consonant
Amike,
Daniel.
erinja (Mostra el perfil) 25 de gener de 2011 18.36.19
One principle of Esperanto word-building is pronounceability. We retain or omit the -o of the first root in the compound, depending on which version is easier to pronounce. That's why I would probably opt for "estingokamiono" rather than "estingkamiono".
Most people would probably go for manĝaĵoŝranko (food cupboard - it's a valid word but I've never heard it used, I just made it up) rather than manĝaĵŝranko as well. Ĵŝr isn't a very easy combination for most people to pronounce!
On the other end, if we're talking about an organization for people who like to play the Japanese game Go ("goo" [go/o] in Esperanto), I think we would talk about a "goorganizo" (go/organizo) and not a "gooorganizo" (go/o/organizo), even though "gooorganizo" is theoretically a valid choice.
horsto (Mostra el perfil) 25 de gener de 2011 21.14.16
pinto: "Lingvo" seems weird because the g is followed by the v which why it's so tempting to drop the g altogether. It falls in the same category to me as words like "knabo" which combines consanants in a way not typical for english speakers.But you certainly have no problems to pronounce kv, f.e. kvalito = quality.
The kv is pronounced like the qu in english.
And if you can pronounce kv, then gv also is easy. You have to pronounce lingvo like lin-gvo.
erinja (Mostra el perfil) 25 de gener de 2011 21.59.58
Kv is not pronounced like the English qu. The Esperanto equivalent of the English qu would be "kŭ" (quality - 'kŭaliti')
Kv isn't common in English, but you will probably find it in the middle of some compound words. I live near a town called Rockville, for example. Of course no one has a problem pronouncing that.
Kv at the beginning of a word probably seems much more difficult to English speakers since we aren't used to it. The only 'English' words beginning with a kv sound that I can think of are loan words from Yiddish - kvetch and kvell, for example.
It would be the same thing with gv, we'd find it in the middle of a word but never in the beginning (I'm sure if I called a new town "Bagville" it would be no problem for people to pronounce it, but Gville would present significant challenges to lots of English-speaking people!)