And here’s the thread I was thinking of where it was commented on me pronouncing the “g” at the end of “thing.” Read posts 146-148. So it is something at least some people do notice as being unusual. (I thought it was a two-syllable word like “finger,” but it was only a one-syllable word. Same idea, though.) And I accidentally bumped a thread where it came up again.
They all rhyme to me, too. So do cot/caught and merry/Mary.
I’m Canadian so I don’t have an accent.
Yeah, while “cot” and “caught” are distinct in my accent, merry/Mary/marry all merge. And there’s accents where “cot” and “caught” have the same vowel, but “merry/Mary/marry” are either all different or two of the three have different pronunciations.
Song, long, gong, and wrong all rhyme to me, and I have the usual Canadian accent. And merry, marry, and Mary all sound identical in my accent.
Accidental Martyr, I’m surprised you don’t notice this.
Maybe this will help: How would you say the second syllable of “finger”? Now, how about “singer”?
Syllable divisions can be tricky, but I’ll bet you come up with “grrr” for the first, and “uhrr” for the second.
OK, here is my attempt to show the difference between "/ˈsɪŋgər/, /ˈsɪŋər/ and /ˈsɪngər/, in that order. There is also the difference between the “aw” in “Paul” and the “ah” in “Bob.”
“Paul and Bob are very good /ˈsɪŋərz/. Paul and Bob are very good /ˈsɪŋgərz/. Paul and Bob are very good /ˈsɪngərz/. /ˈsɪŋər/. /ˈsɪŋgər/. /ˈsɪŋgər/.” The thing is, if you are not used to making the distinction, you might think they all sound the same, like “mary/merry/Mary” do to me unless I’m really paying close attention.
They don’t sound that way to me, and when I pronounce them, the are articulated at different points in my throat, and my mouthshape is a little different. \
ETA:
While the IPA for the vowel in “cot” is /ɒ/, when I say it, to me it sounds closer to /ɑ/. My lips are not rounded when I say “cot,” but they are rounded when I say “caught.”
Which makes sense, if you read here:
The vowel in my “cot” definitely feels to me to be a little higher in the throat and with a tenser jaw and lips (unrounded) than the vowel in “caught.”
I just looked at the IPA chart and I think you’re right. The way I pronounce them, the difference is between so-called “rounded” and “unrounded” vowels. “Song” and “gong” are pronounced with the unrounded vowel /ɑ/ whereas “long” and “wrong” are pronounced with the rounded vowel /ɒ/.
The more I read this thread the more I don’t understand why I speak this way, based on my background, because apparently the people who do speak this way didn’t grow up where I did.
Gosh darn it. The last one should be /ˈsɪngər/.
My accent is from Long Island/New York, and we pronounce all of the example pairs given here differently. Cot/caught, Mary/merry/marry, dog/log, dawn/don, pen/pin, etc. - all different. As far I as can remember, any time a pronunciation thread pops up here, the words are pronounced differently in the New York/LI accent.
But it always makes me think if there is one of these pairs that the rest of America tends to pronounce differently that would be pronounced the same here. Anyone know of any?
I’m a midwesterner. All those words rhyme. The only word I can think of that is spelled like “ong” but sounds like “ahng” (in my dialect) is “Bongo”.
Yeah, actually, I was thinking about this earlier, and New York is one major accent that comes to mind that doesn’t have cot/caught and doesn’t have Mary/merry/marry merged.
I’m surprised people think all four sound the same, even more that song and gong rhyme while being different from the other two.
Gong (gone-gh) rhymes with bong, dong, pong, King Kong, Chong (from Cheech and Chong), thong…
Song (sawng) rhymes with long, strong, “can’t we all just get along?”
It’s why “Long Island” sounds like “Lawn Guy Land”. 
Sure gong does rhyme with bong, dong, pong, King Kong and Chong, and thong. And with song, long, strong, and along too.
for me:
song, long, talk, walk, caught, dog, paw – aw sound
gong, tongs, bong, pot, pa, cot – ah sound
N.B.: aw and ah are two different sounds
To me, the first one sounds like you are saying “sinners”. The second one sounds normal to me. The third sounds pretty much identical to the second.
I’ve actually been sitting here trying to say /ˈsɪŋər/ and I physically can’t do it. I can’t make a /ŋ/ sound without a /g/ The process of taking my tongue off the soft palate just automatically makes a /g/ sound as they “unstick” from each other.
For me, gong, tong and bong should be on the top group. Pot, pa and cot are the only ones with an “ah” sound. And though “bong” has the “aw” sound, “bongo” has the “ah” sound.
When you say this, it makes me think that /ŋ/ doesn’t exist in your accent at all.
The third may be harder to hear, but I am saying “sin-ger.” You can do it, too, and I’m fairly certain it will be different in your accent. Say “sin”. Then say “grr.” “Sin-ger.” In the first and second pronunciations, my tongue does not touch my teeth. In the last one, it does, as in the production of a usual English “n” sound. And the back of my tongue is flat instead of raised (which it is in the /ng/ sound.)
Here is a visual illustration of the /n/ sound.
Here is /ng/, which is in my first two examples.
That page also has another explanation of /ng/ + /g/.
Now, the /ng/ and /g/ have pretty much identical tongue positions, so it’s easy to produce the sound accidentally, but when producing “ng”, you just release the sound at the end, while if you’re adding the “g,” you kind of force a “g” sound instead of merely releasing the “/ng/” if that makes sense. Like I said, I do this myself when I am over-enunciating.
Now, like Acsenray says, it’s possible your dialect does not make that distinction. And, like I said, it’s not one I really notice myself unless I’m really keying in on it. But there is a distinction to most American English speakers (even if they’re not aware of it), and it’s important enough that it is addressed in English language classes (as you see above.)