Pronunciation

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About phonetic notation

Seven symbols

As far as possible we use general English spelling (let's call it English notation) to show the Danish pronunciation.

However, there are some cases where English notation is not enough, so we've used the following phonetic symbols:

[ə] is the neutral, unstressed sound like the i in pencil, the a in about, the o in harmony, and so forth

[ü] is the Danish y. It is pronounced like the ee in geese, but with the lips rounded like the oo in goose.

[ð] is the soft d, which has no English equivalent.

[ʁ] is the uvular r. It is produced in the back of the throat

[ʌ] is the short ah in what

[e] is the short e in pen, [e:] is similar, but longer.

[ɔ] is the short o in stop

Approximated sounds

Some other sounds, like the Danish ø, have no English equivalents, so they are approximated here with whatever notation works best.

Ø is approximated as eu, other times as [ü]; å is sometimes aw, other times oh, and so on.

For example, listen to the å sound in these words: et lår Play sound

(aw) and et låg Play sound

(oh)

Short sounds

Sounds can be short or long, which makes them hard to distinguish using simple notation.

For example, ordinarily in English the i in et slips Play sound

can only be shown by the long ee in sleeps. The u in en bus Play sound

can only be shown by the long oo in boos.

To get around this and to show that these are short sounds we use italics: sleeps, boos.

Stressed syllables

To show where the stress lies is a word, the syllable is shown in bold

en cigar

= see-gah (see = short, gah = stressed)

et bageri

= bae-ə-ʁee (ʁee = both short and stressed)