I was in a Spanish department store today and I saw one of of these - a genuine jamón bag. This led me to thought for the day: Have you ever noticed that when you say ‘handbag’ in English, you actually say ‘hambag’?
It’s all a question of elision followed by assimilation.
First of all the ‘d’ in handbag is left out. The same happens in the following items:
- Mashed potatoes
- Landlord
- Windmill
So as a result of elision (the emission of a sound for ease of pronunciation) we no longer have handbags, we have hanbags.
Now comes assimilation. That is when one sound starts to sound more like another, usually at a boundary between words when the words are produced quickly. So say hanbag quickly (i.e. at the speed you would normally pronounce it in spoken conversation) and it will become a hambag. The ‘n’ starts to sound like an ‘m’ - not exactly, but more or less.
The same happens in the following items:
- ‘John Belushi’ becomes Jom Belushi
- ‘The drinks are on me’ becomes The drinks are om-me
- ‘Human being’ becomes Humam being
What’s happening in each case is that the lips come together to produce the ‘b’ sound. And if an ‘n’ is reverberating while the lips meet, the resulting sound is an ‘m’.
I wouldn’t expect learners to spend time pronouncing their words with such attention to immaculate detail. Elision and assimilation are things that happen naturally. They refer to little changes in sound that happen in order to facilitate speech. And I can’t imagine a situation in which failure to make these subtle changes would result in a misunderstanding. But it can be interesting to know.
6 responses so far ↓
1 Leo - Canada // Nov 22, 2008 at 4:56 pm
I agree with you. I don’t think we should teach this kind of thing to students. Pretty much like you said they happen naturally.
I have an activity where I give my students two slips of paper (a & B) with different words but the same pronunciation and they have to write down the words and then compare.
for example:
A B
my spies mice pies
ice cream I scream
they love it!
Cheers
2 Sima // Nov 24, 2008 at 3:39 pm
Dear Jemmie,
hi,
Back I am once again ,having a ball in your web site,What ya just pointed is spot on . This is the very “Ease of Articulation “. The bare truth is that since let’s say for the case of “human being, /b/is a bilabial sound, when preceded by /n/, /n/ changes to /m/ which is bilabial one too to assimilate .
Life is that simple
& you are On the crest of a wave, so pleae keep it going
Thanks & cheers
3 admin // Nov 24, 2008 at 6:01 pm
Hello Sima. Great to hear from you. Thanks for your encouragement. You’re right - it is simple isn’t it?
And Leo - I love your idea. I was just having a look for some more examples and have discovered that such pairs are called ‘Oronyms’. There are a lot of standard ones floating around on the internet such as:
The stuffy nose can lead to problems.
The stuff he knows can lead to problems.
The parcel was secured by a grey tape.
The parcel was secured by a great ape.
A couple of links (or is it, “A cup pull of links”):
http://www.fun-with-words.com/nym_oronyms.html
http://users.tinyonline.co.uk/gswithenbank/oronyms.htm
4 Leo - Canada // Nov 25, 2008 at 5:27 am
hahhahahha
I just had a blast with the “Oronyms”. I had no idea they had a name.
Good to know and thanks for the links.
Keep it up!
5 Michael // Dec 14, 2009 at 5:48 pm
I chased a bug around a tree
I’ll have his blood he knows I will
Try saying that quickly.
6 admin // Dec 14, 2009 at 5:52 pm
I just did - with interesting results!
Thanks for that one Michael. Did you make it up?
Jamie =)
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