Hard and soft g

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A hard g vs a soft g is a feature that occurs in many languages, including English, in which there are two sounds both represented by the letter "g". A hard g is a velar stop /g/ represented by "g", and a soft g is an affricate /dʒ/ or a fricative /ʒ/ or something else represented by "g", too.

[edit] English

In English, the hard g is the sound of the "g" /g/ in "get", "give" and "gallon", as distinct from the soft "g" /dʒ/ in "gentle" and "giant". The soft g usually occurs when the "g" comes before the letters "e", "i" and "y" (with notable exceptions), while the hard "g" can occur anywhere.

[edit] Other languages

In French, "g" has a hard form /g/ that occurs before "a", "o" and "u", like in English, and a soft "g" which is /ʒ/ which occurs before "e", "i" and "y". The phoneme /g/ can occur before "e", "i" and "y" by putting a "u" after it (e.g. "gentil" /ʒɑ̃ti/, "guerre" /gɛʁ/) and the phoneme /ʒ/ can occur before "a" or "o" by putting an "e" after it (e.g. "mangue" /mɑ̃g/, "mangeons" /mɑ̃ʒɔ̃/).

In Luganda, "g" has a hard form /g/ that occurs before "a", "e", "o", "u" and "w", and a soft "g" /dʒ/ which occurs before "i" and "y".

[edit] References