Voiced velar nasal

A voiced velar nasal, also known as eng, engma, or agma, is a special sound used in some spoken languages. You can hear this sound in English words like sing or when the letter n comes before letters like k or g, as in English or ink.

The symbol that represents this sound in the International Phonetic Alphabet is ⟨ŋ⟩. This symbol looks similar to other nasal sound symbols, but each has its own small differences.

Not all languages use this sound. While most languages have the sounds /m/ and /n/, the voiced velar nasal /ŋ/ is less common. It is found in many Australian Aboriginal languages, languages of Sub-Saharan Africa, East Asian and Southeast Asian languages, and Polynesian languages. In some languages, like English, this sound appears only in certain positions, such as the end of a syllable. Other languages, like Russian, do not use this sound at all.

Features

The voiced velar nasal is a special sound used in some languages. It is made by closing the mouth and letting air flow through the nose, using the back of the tongue near the soft palate, while the vocal cords vibrate to make it sound soft.

This sound is created by pushing air only from the lungs, using muscles between the ribs and in the belly, and directing the air down the middle of the tongue instead of to the sides.

Occurrence

The voiced velar nasal is a special sound used in many languages around the world. In English, we hear this sound when we say words like "sing" or "ink". It’s the same sound you make when you say the “ng” at the end of a word.

This sound is represented by the symbol ⟨ŋ⟩ in the International Phonetic Alphabet, which is a special way to write sounds that helps linguists study how languages work. Many languages use this sound, making it an important part of how we speak and understand each other.