pronunciation - Why do people often say 'hambag' for 'handbag'?


Edit


The comments here are full of disbelievers!



  • "I've never heard handbag pronounced that way. Which country are you from?"


Oh ye of little faith! So - I've attached a couple of examples here from that video site place. Watch the first from 23 seconds in. There's about five or six 'hambags' in the next half a minute: Hambag. Here's a second one, an American English speaker this time. He also says it about 23 seconds in too: A bag for sweet hams. Lastly, here's an altogether different pronunciation which you may find rather interesting. It's by far the best: A handbag?


The question


It's all in the title really. The other day I was hanging out with some teachers. They were all talking about /hæmbægz / i.e. 'hambags'. Ever since then I've been hearing people do this all the time. What's with the bags for ham?


What are the restrictions there on dropping one of the letters. I mean I can't say 'bangroll' /bæŋrəʊl*/ for bankroll. And I can't drop the /d/ in 'bedroom' and say /berʊm*/. Why can I drop a /d/ in 'handbag' when I can't drop a /k/ in 'bankroll'?


Secondly, what's happening to the /n/ there? Is it changing? If so why? After all we can't change the /m/ for example in 'hemlock' to 'henlock', although that would be much easier to say.


What's with the ham?



Answer



There are two processes at work here:



  1. Alveolar elision.

  2. Alveolar assimilation.


Just behind your upper teeth - you can feel it with your tongue - there is a little shelf-like part of your mouth. It slopes slightly upwards. Behind that your mouth suddenly arches upwards to form the roof of your mouth. That shelf-like part you can feel there behind your teeth is called your alveolar ridge. In English, we make the following consonant sounds there:



  • / t, d, n, l, s, z /


[Those last two sounds, /s/ and /z/, are a bit different. We don't touch central bit of the tip of the tongue against the ridge with these. Instead, (- there's a kind of line or seam that runs down the centre of the tongue there called the mid-sagittal line), we create a furrow along the mid-saggital line and the edges of our tongue rest against that shelf as air whistles down the channel in the middle.]


Anyhow, those sounds that we make on the alveolar ridge are very unstable in English. They very often disappear or they change dramatically according to the other sounds that they are next to.


Of all of these sounds, /t/ and /d/, the alveolar plosives (these consonants are like mini ex-plosions) are the most unstable, closely followed by /n/.


Alveolar plosive elision


As a rule, when the sound /t/ or /d/ occurs at the end of a syllable, it is liable to deletion whenever the following two conditions are met:



  1. It is surrounded by consonants (not including /r/ or /h/).

  2. The preceding consonant has the same voicing. (It must be unvoiced for /t/).


This means we can drop the /t/ in left work, because /f/ like /t/ is voiceless (there's no buzzing of the vocal folds). We can't drop the /t/ in halt work though, because the /l/ there is voiced.


This context will allow for /t/ or /d/ elision in nearly all cases in Gen Am and SSB English. However there are many other instances where /d/ or /t/ may be also be elided. For example, /t/ is freely omissible in normal speech in contractions with not - regardless of whether followed by a vowel:



  • aɪ 'kɑ:n 'ɑ:nsə [I can't answer - Southern Standard British English]

  • aɪ 'kæn 'ænsɚ [I can't answer - General American]


Alveolar assimilation


The consonants /t/, /d/ and /n/ are always liable to change according to the sound that follows. They remain the same type of consonant - /t/ and /d/ remain plosive and /n/ remains nasal - but they change their place of articulation. In front of bilabials - sounds made with the lips, namely /p, b, m, w/ - they become bilabial. In front of velar sounds /k, g/ they become velar.


For /n/ this means it becomes an /m/ in front of bilabials and /ŋ/ in front of velars:



  • im person, im bed, im my house, woman im white

  • ing Cambridge, ing Greece


This is never compulsory, but will happen the vast majority of the time for most speakers.


Handbag to Hambag


Here we see the alveolar elision of /d/. It is likely to disappear because it occurs at the end of the syllable hand, and is surrounded by the voiced consonants /n, b/.


That leaves us with /hænbæg/. The /n/ there is now going to be subject to alveolar assimilation: it is now liable to change to /m/ under the influence of the following bilabial, /b/: /hæmbæg/


Some further examples of alveolar assimilation



  • Hop pants

  • Whipebait

  • Hopmail

  • Heab porter

  • Birb bath

  • Goob morning

  • Imput

  • Im brief

  • Im my opinion

  • Am why exactly?

  • Hopmaildok-kom

  • lighk green

  • Goog karma

  • Deag give away

  • Easterng Kenya

  • Wimbledong Common

  • Womangkind


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