I wonder if the "g" in the -ing forms is pronounced. When I hear it it seems as if it's not pronounced sometimes or just slightly, though sometimes I've been told that I should pronounce "g" for example in "meeting" just to avoid saying "mitten".
So how should I pronounce "-ing"?
Sometimes -ing is written in an informal way as -in' such as:
taking
takin'
Is the letter "g" in each case pronounced differently?
The 'g' in -ing is never pronounced. What is pronounced is the velar nasal consonant represented in IPA as [ŋ]. In some dialects, this is replaced by the alveolar nasal consonant represented in IPA as [n]. This is the phonetics that the -in' ending represents.
The difference between [ŋg] and just [ŋ] can be heard in the difference between the words finger and singer.
You should never use a [g] in meeting. Use [ŋ] (which is usually represented in English spelling as 'ng') and not [n], [ŋg], or [ng].
The local dialect in several regions of the U.S., and apparently in parts of Britain as well, uses [ɪn] rather than [ɪŋ] for the suffix -ing. This is sometimes spelled -in'. The people speaking these dialects can pronounce the consonant [ŋ] just fine; for example, singin' would be pronounced [sɪŋɪn]. For more information on this, see this dialect blog posting.
-in' is a rendering of the pronunciation of specific dialects and why/when a single speaker might actually use one or the other.
Using an apostrophe in place of a "g" is an informal colloquiallism. It is usually found inside a quotation, suggesting the speaker did not use much care when enunciating. Specifically, it's used to indicate the verb was spoken such that the final "g" was omitted: "We were walkin' to the store, not botherin' nobody, when, all of a sudden, out o' nowhere, this guy starts a-hollerin' at us for no good reason!"
(It's similar to using o' in place of "of " - as found in the preceding example).
Sometimes it's also used in song titles, when the singer doesn't carefully enunciate the final "g" in an "-ing" verb (a la "Takin' Care of Business" and "The Times They Are a-Changin'").
The velar nasal ng lost the final g in English around the end of the 16th century. The phenomenon is called ng-coalescence. From Wikipedia:
As a result of Ng-coalescence, Middle English [sɪŋɡ] sing came to be pronounced [sɪŋ]. As well as in word-final position, Ng-coalescence was applied also in cases where a verb ending in -ng was followed by a vowel-initial suffix, so *si***ng***ing* and *si***ng***er* also underwent the change.
Otherwise, word-internal -ng- did not undergo coalescence and the pronunciation [ŋg] was retained, as in finger and angle...
Some accents, however, do not show the full effects of Ng-coalescence...
However, in Romanian (a language I know) the g at the end is pronounced such as in the words: luɲg. Not all ng are ɲg such as kreangə , ungʲ . 1
Notes: 1) ŋ may appear or not in various languages. In some languages it cannot appear in the front position (e.g. English) or in the final position. In some languages it can appear in all positions.
See World Atlas of Languages.
2) ŋ can be seen as a phoneme or as an allophone of n before g or k
3) k remains next to ŋ in nk: tæɲk (English), taɲk, , mɨɲkare (Romanian)
Actually, in older stages of English, the -ing form was used only for the gerund, while the present participle had an "-end-" ending. The "-in'" ending in colloquial English, southern American English, and many British dialects is probably a leftover from this "-end-" inflection.
You never skip the 'g' in 'ing' within writing unless it is informal, however you are not required to skip the g in informal text. If you were to be typing an e-mail to your boss, for example, saying "I'm comin' in tomorrow" would be inappropriate. If you were speaking to a friend, unprofessionally, it would be perfectly okay to do such a thing.
When speaking, it usually comes natural to skip the 'g' in 'ing' regardless of setting or who your are with. To be quite honest, here in the south, skipping the 'g' is so common that it is simply part of a southern dialect.
I'm fairly certain there are no set rules on this sort of accenting; it's more about whether or not you are speaking loosely (about friends and family) or more strictly (teachers, superiors)
If you are a normal American, then you pronounce words like king, ring, and sing just as they appear. You also pronounce progressive verbs that end in ing, such as running and being, are essentially pronounced een at the end of the word, basically rhyming with seen, mean, lean, etc. There are some dialects of English where the g can barely be heard in progressives, but in contemporary English this is gone. The informal is to pronounce the ing not like een, but like in, thus rhyming with words like sin or fin. English only has a specific number of strict sounds that are pronounced, while dictionaries will include additional sounds, they are pretty much gone from most common dialects and accents of English. You will be considered a jerk, if you make a habit of trying to pronounce contemporary English words in archaic ways. English has evolved, this is why the word knight, which was once pronounced with the k sound, the gh was a throaty sound, and the I was pronounced like an e, is now pronounced like nite, but the old spelling managed to stick.
