pronunciation of "onion", "comfort"

Hi,

Since we already have a couple of "pronunciation of" threads, I thought I'd throw in another one.

onion: [Vnj@n] vs. [VJj@n]
comfort: [cVmf@`?] vs. [cVFf@`?]

Are you assimilating [n]/[m] to [J]/[F] and if so, is this generally done or only restricted to informal speech?

'Onion' ( UN-yun; UN-yin ) & 'Comfort' ( KUM-fert ). No assimilation here that I know of even in informal speech.

I don't practice any assimilation, either, even informally.

This reminds me of my "Speak and Spell" when I was a kid.

"Spell unYON"

I would spend hours trying to decifer what the bloody thing was trying to say. The worst was "Spell Ghee........Wrong try again.........Spell Ghee.......that is incorrect......the correct spelling of the word ghee is K....E....Y.......Ghee!!!

Onion rhymes with bunion rhymes with Bunyan

For my speech:

"onion" ["VnjIn] (no assimilation to the nasal palatal stop)
"comfort" ["k_hVFf@`t] (I do have assimilation there--it's a labiodental nasal stop)

I don't have assimilation in either of those words.

onion - ["Vnj@n]
comfort - ["kVmf@`t]

I have learned to produce [N] and [F] (in the sequence [mf], an allophone of [nf]) when speaking Spanish, though.

Sorry, typos:

I don't have assimilation in either of those words.

onion - ["Vnj@n]
comfort - ["kVmf@`t]

I have learned to produce [N] and [F] (in the sequence [Ff], an allophone of /nf/) when speaking Spanish, though.

Lazar, I'm surprised you don't have /nf/ or /mf/ --> [F] assimilation at least in normal speech. It's very commonly heard here.

Thanks for your answers, I'm a little surprised that these assimilations (especially the /mf/ --> [fF] one) aren't more common.

Kirk, does that mean you also assimilate /nf/ to /Ff/, eg. in conference (I guess with a nasalized [A~] then)?

Sorry, my name is still Thomas. Also, I accidently wrote "c" in my first post instead of "k_h".

<<Kirk, does that mean you also assimilate /nf/ to /Ff/, eg. in conference (I guess with a nasalized [A~] then)?>>

Yeah, that's a possible way I'd say it. Of course, the nasality over the vowel isn't really necessary, as the nasal labiodental [F] already has nasality. However, I believe the preceding the vowel does receieve some nasality, but not anymore than would be expected for any word with a nasal following it. Anyway, so yes, ["k_hA~Ff@`Ints] is one way I can say it. Without the assimilation it'd be ["k_hA~nf@`Ints].

I do have to say that at least in my dialect, /nj/ does assimilate to [J], and /nf/ and /mf/ do assimilate to [F]; I myself find trying to not assimilate such to be quite akward, and to require trying to deliberately not do such.

<<Lazar, I'm surprised you don't have /nf/ or /mf/ --> [F] assimilation at least in normal speech. It's very commonly heard here.>>

I definitely don't have /nf/ --> [F] assimilation. Even in the most rapid speech, I always have distinct alveolar contact in /nf/.

As for /mf/ --> [F] assimilation, it's a little harder to tell (since [m] and [f] are very close to one another), but again, I think that in even the most rapid speech, /mf/ usually has bilabial contact for me.

Sorry, typos again. (I'm always putting [f] instead of [F]).

<<Lazar, I'm surprised you don't have /nf/ or /mf/ --> [F] assimilation at least in normal speech. It's very commonly heard here.>>

I definitely don't have /nf/ --> [F] assimilation. Even in the most rapid speech, I always have distinct alveolar contact in /nf/.

As for /mf/ --> [F] assimilation, it's a little harder to tell (since [m] and [f] are very close to one another), but again, I think that in even the most rapid speech, /mf/ usually has bilabial contact for me.