In the Latin-based orthographies of many European languages (including English), the letter ⟨g⟩ is used in different contexts to represent two distinct phonemes, often called hard and soft ⟨g⟩. The sound of a hard ⟨g⟩ (which often precedes the non-front vowels ⟨a o u⟩) is usually the voiced velar plosive [ɡ] (as in gangrene or golf) while the sound of a soft ⟨g⟩ (typically before ⟨i e y⟩) may be a fricative or affricate, depending on the language. In English, the sound of soft ⟨g⟩ is the affricate /dʒ/, as in Genesis, giraffe, and gymnasium.
Contents
History
This alternation has its origins in a historical palatalization of /ɡ/ which took place in Late Latin, and led to a change in the pronunciation of the sound [ɡ] before the front vowels [e] and [i]. Later, other languages not descended from Latin, such as English, inherited this feature as an orthographic convention. The Scandinavian languages, however, have undergone their shift independently.
English
In English orthography, the pronunciation of hard ⟨g⟩ is /ɡ/ and that of soft ⟨g⟩ is /dʒ/; the French soft ⟨g⟩, /ʒ/, survives in a number of French loanwords (e.g. regime, genre). In words of Greco-Latinate origin, the soft ⟨g⟩ pronunciation occurs before ⟨e i y⟩ while the hard ⟨g⟩ pronunciation occurs elsewhere. In some words of Germanic origin (e.g. get, give), loan words from other languages (e.g. geisha, pierogi), and irregular Greco-Latinate words (e.g. gynecology), the hard pronunciation may occur before ⟨e i y⟩ as well.
Digraphs and trigraphs, such as ⟨ng⟩, ⟨gg⟩, and ⟨dge⟩, have their own pronunciation rules.
The orthography of soft ⟨g⟩ is fairly consistent: a soft ⟨g⟩ is almost always followed by ⟨e i y⟩. The notable exceptions are gaol (now more commonly spelled jail) and margarine (a French borrowing whose original hard ⟨g⟩ mysteriously softened). Algae is sometimes cited as an exception but is actually conformant, ⟨ae⟩ being an alternate spelling for a vowel in the ⟨e i y⟩ family. In some words a soft ⟨g⟩ has lost its trailing ⟨e⟩ due to suffixing (e.g. fledgling, judgment, pledgor).
While ⟨c⟩, which also has hard and soft pronunciations, exists alongside ⟨k⟩ (which always indicates a hard pronunciation), ⟨g⟩ has no analogous letter or letter combination which consistently indicates a hard ⟨g⟩ sound, even though English uses ⟨j⟩ consistently for the soft ⟨g⟩ sound (the rationale for the spelling change of "gaol" to "jail"). This leads to special issues regarding the "neatness" of orthography when suffixes are added to words that end in a hard-⟨g⟩ sound.
Suffixation
When suffixes are added to words ending with a hard or soft ⟨g⟩ (such as -ed, -ing, -er, -est, -ism, -ist, -edness, -ish(ness), -ily, -iness, -ier, -iest, -ingly, -edly, and -ishly), the sound is normally maintained. Sometimes the normal rules of spelling changes before suffixes can help signal whether the hard or soft sound is intended. For example, as an accidental byproduct of the rule that doubles consonants in this situation after a short vowel, a double ⟨gg⟩ will normally indicate the hard pronunciation (e.g. bagged is pronounced /ˈbæɡd/, not as /ˈbædʒd/).
There are occasional exceptions where alternations between the hard and soft sound occur before different suffixes. Examples are analogous (hard) vs. analogy (soft); similarly, prodigal with prodigy. These are generally cases where the entire word, including the suffix, has been imported from Latin, and the general Romance-language pattern of soft ⟨g⟩ before front vowels, but hard ⟨g⟩ otherwise, is preserved.
Sometimes a silent letter is added to help indicate pronunciation. For example, a silent ⟨e⟩ usually indicates the soft pronunciation, as in change; this may be maintained before a suffix to indicate this pronunciation (as in changeable), despite the rule that usually drops this letter. A silent ⟨i⟩ can also indicate a soft pronunciation, particularly with the suffixes -gion and -gious (as in region, contagious). A silent ⟨u⟩ can indicate a hard pronunciation in words borrowed from French (as in analogue, league, guide) or words influenced by French spelling conventions (guess, guest); a silent ⟨h⟩ serves a similar purpose in Italian-derived words (ghetto, spaghetti).
A silent ⟨e⟩ can occur at the end of a word – or at the end of a component root word that is part of a larger word – after ⟨g⟩ as well as word-internally. In this situation, the ⟨e⟩ usually serves a marking function that helps to indicate that the ⟨g⟩ immediately before it is soft. Examples include image, management, and pigeon. Such a silent ⟨e⟩ also indicates that the vowel before ⟨g⟩ is a historic long vowel, as in rage, oblige, and range. When adding one of the above suffixes, this silent ⟨e⟩ is often dropped and the soft pronunciation remains. While ⟨dge⟩ commonly indicates a soft pronunciation, the silent ⟨e⟩ may be dropped before another consonant while retaining the soft pronunciation in a number of words such judgment and abridgment. Also, the word veg, a clipped form of vegetate, retains the soft pronunciation despite being spelled without a silent ⟨e⟩ (i.e., pronounced as if spelled vedge). Similarly, soft ⟨g⟩ is sometimes replaced by ⟨j⟩ in some names of commercial entities, such as with Enerjy Software, or "Majic 105.7" in Cleveland, Ohio and some names commonly spelled with ⟨j⟩ are given unusual soft ⟨g⟩ spellings such as Genna and Gennifer.
Letter combinations
A number of two-letter combinations or digraphs follow their own pronunciation patterns and, as such, may not follow the hard/soft distinction of ⟨g⟩. For example, ⟨ng⟩ often represents /ŋ/ (as in ring) or /ŋɡ/ as in finger. The letters ⟨nge⟩, when final, represent /ndʒ/, as in orange; when not final their pronunciation varies according to the word's etymology (e.g. /ndʒ/ in danger, /ŋg/ in anger, /ŋ/ in banger). In most cases, ⟨gg⟩ represents /ɡ/ as in dagger, but it may also represent /dʒ/ or /ɡdʒ/ as in suggest and exaggerate. Other letter combinations that don't follow the paradigm include ⟨gh⟩, ⟨gn⟩, and ⟨gm⟩.
The digraph ⟨gu⟩ is sometimes used to indicate a hard ⟨g⟩ pronunciation before ⟨i e y⟩ (e.g. guess, guitar, Guinness), including cases where ⟨e⟩ is silent (rogue, intrigue, and, in Commonwealth spelling, catalogue and analogue). In some cases, the intervening ⟨u⟩ is pronounced as /w/ (distinguish, unguent).
Latin script
All modern Romance languages make the hard/soft distinction with ⟨g⟩, except a few that have undergone spelling reforms such as Ladino or Haitian Creole. The hard ⟨g⟩ is [ɡ] in almost all these languages (with the exception of Galician, which may instead be a voiceless pharyngeal fricative), though the soft ⟨g⟩ pronunciation, which occurs before ⟨i e y⟩, differs amongst them as follows:
Different languages use different strategies to indicate a hard pronunciation before front vowels:
A soft pronunciation before non-front vowels is usually indicated by a silent ⟨e⟩ or ⟨i⟩ (e.g. Italian giorno, French mangeons), though Spanish, Portuguese, and Catalan use ⟨j⟩ as in jueves.
Several Nordic languages also make a hard/soft distinction. Again, the hard ⟨g⟩ is [ɡ] in most of these languages, but the soft ⟨g⟩ differs as follows:
Icelandic orthography is a bit more complicated by having lenited pronunciations of ⟨g⟩.
Other languages typically have hard ⟨g⟩ pronunciations except possibly in loanwords where it may represent [ʒ] or [dʒ].
The orthography of Ganda is similar to Italian in having a soft ⟨g⟩ pronunciation before front vowels (namely ⟨i y⟩) and ⟨gy⟩ indicates this soft pronunciation.
Because Esperanto orthography is phonemic, ⟨g⟩ always represents a hard g; a soft g is represented by the accented letter ⟨ĝ⟩
Other scripts
In Modern Greek, which uses the Greek alphabet, the Greek letter gamma (uppercase: ⟨Γ⟩; lowercase: ⟨γ⟩) – which is ancestral to the Roman letters ⟨g⟩ and ⟨c⟩ – has "soft-type" and "hard-type" pronunciations, though Greek speakers do not use such a terminology. The "soft" pronunciation (that is, the voiced palatal fricative [ʝ]) occurs before ⟨αι⟩ and ⟨ε⟩ (both which represent [e]), and before ⟨ει⟩, ⟨η⟩, ⟨ι⟩, ⟨οι⟩, and ⟨υι⟩ (which all represent [i]). In other instances, the "hard" pronunciation (that is, the voiced velar fricative [ɣ]) occurs.
In the Russian alphabet (a variant of Cyrillic), ⟨г⟩ represents both hard (твёрдый [ˈtvʲo.rdɨj]) and soft (мягкий [ˈmʲæ.xʲkʲɪj]) pronunciations, [ɡ] and [ɡʲ], respectively. The soft pronunciation of ⟨г⟩ occurs before any of the "softening" vowels ⟨е ё и ю я ь⟩ and the hard pronunciation occurs elsewhere.
In Modern Hebrew, which uses the Hebrew alphabet, the letter gimel (⟨ג⟩) typically has the [ɡ] sound within Hebrew words, although in some Sephardic dialects, it represents [ɡ] or [dʒ] when written with a dagesh (i.e., a dot placed inside the letter: ⟨גּ⟩), and [ɣ] when without a dagesh. An apostrophe-like symbol called a Geresh can be added immediately to the left of a gimel (i.e., ⟨ג׳⟩) to indicate that the gimel represents an affricate /d͡ʒ/).