| Norwegian letter(s) | English sound |
| d | silent at end of word; and in -ld, -nd, -rd |
| ig | ee |
| eg | ay |
| h | silent before consonants, such as in hv- |
| j, gj, hj | yuh, as in yes |
| kj, tj | sh, but softer and more palatalized (as in German) |
| sj, skj | sh |
| sl | shl |
| ki, ky, kei, køy | sh, but softer and more palatalized (as in German) |
| ski, sky, skei, skøy | sh |
| gi, gy, gei, gøy | yuh |
| g + other vowels | guh |
| sk + other vowels | sk |
| -egn, -egl, -øgn | g is silent |
| ng | nasalized, as in singer and not finger |
| æ | ah as in cat |
| ø | ay, but with lips rounded |
| å | aw as in saw |
Norwegian I Tutorial: Pronunciation
Hi, I stumbled upon your blog and saw this tutorial which I think is great. However, I would just like to "correct" something. For the -egn, -egl and -øgn the g is sometimes silent and sometimes not... And sometimes the g is substituted with another letter. If we take the word "regn" the letter g is substituted by i so it is pronounced "rein". In the word "regle" you actually pronounce the g. And in the word "løgn" you substitute the g with a y. Pronounced "løyn".
ResponderExcluirThe letters kj are not pronounced sh. It is a letter combination that is very difficult to pronounce right for the foreigners. And sometimes also for the (younger) Norwegians... There should be no s involved in the pronounciation. So the words "skjørt" (skirt) and "kjørt" (has driven) should not be pronounced the same way.
Gøy is pronounced with a guh (in bokmål).
And unless you live in the eastern parts of Norway sl is not pronounced shl. Like people from Oslo say they're from Oshlo.... People from other parts of Norway call the capital Oslo with no h involved.
I am a Norwegian living in Italy so I know how it feels to be the "Foreigner" that's trying to learn the language. Keep up the good work! You have a great blog!
Hello, thank you so much for your additional information :)
Excluir