On 1 February 2011 11:10, Juan Mautalen <jgmauta...@yahoo.com.ar> wrote:
> Yes, that correct. Its pronounciation is very different from N. For instance, > "ÑOM" in spanish is pronounced as GNOM in english. GN is a fairly unlikely English representation of Spanish Ñ or ñ. In ordinary English orthography, an initial GN has the G completely silent, and the N unaffected, so an English GNOM would be indistinguishable from an English NOM. The same is true for initial KN. There are exceptions, of course (what would English spelling be without them?), as well as dialectical and historical differences. It's easy to say that Spanish Ñ is the initial sound in English words like NEW, but there are some not so uncommon English dialects in which NEW has no glide and is indistinguishable from NOO. Perhaps one unambiguous way of putting it is to tell the English reader that Ñ is the sound you'd get if you put an ordinary N sound in front of the English word YOU. Regardless, the accent is evidently very important in Spanish, the classic example being "feliz año nuevo" vs "feliz ano nuevo". Tony H. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- For IBM-MAIN subscribe / signoff / archive access instructions, send email to lists...@bama.ua.edu with the message: GET IBM-MAIN INFO Search the archives at http://bama.ua.edu/archives/ibm-main.html
