u Short [u], like the vowel in English ‘puli’: Pulli ([puli] ‘pullover’). Long [u:], like the
vowel in English ‘tool’: Puder ([pu:der] ‘powder’).
ü/y These represent the same set of sounds as produced by performing English ‘ee’ in
‘green’ and pursing the lips. This produces a front vowel sound with rounded lips,
long in grün ([grü:n] ‘green’) and typisch ([tü:pish] ‘typical’); short in Küsse
([küse] ‘kisses’).
j This is pronounced ‘y’ in German: Juli ([yu:li] ‘July’).1.5 Where umlauted vowels (ä, ö, ü) mark grammatical changes, e.g. in forming the
plural of a noun or the subjunctive of a verb, the umlauted vowel has the same length
as the vowel it replaces: both short in kKamm, Kämme ([kam] [keme] ‘comb’,
‘combs’); both long in kam, käme ([ka:m] [ke:me] ‘came’, ‘would come’). An umlaut
basically takes a vowel produced at the back of the mouth [a a: o o: u u:] and moves it
to the front of the mouth [e e: ö ö: ü ü:] but with the lips shaped as they were for the
back vowel.
2 Diphthongs
2.1 Diphthongs are vowel glides. The tongue ‘glides’ from one position to another as the
sound is produced.
au Like English ‘ow’ in ‘how now’. The vowel in German braun is very like the
vowel in English ‘brown’.
ai/ei Both pronounced like the glide in English ‘ice’ (German Eis).
au/euBoth these combinations of letters represent the sound ‘oi’: Mäuse ([moize]
‘mice’); Europa ([oiro:pa] ‘Europe)’.
Note that äu is the umlauted form of the back vowel glide au: Haus ([haus] ‘house’),
Häuser ([hoizer] ‘houses’).2.2 In German, ei is always pronounced ‘eye’, and ie is always pronounced ‘ee’. Thus,
saying the second letter of the pair always produces the correct sound for English
speakers: Wein ([vain] ‘wine’) sounds like English ‘vine’. Bier ([bi:r] ‘beer’) sounds like
English ‘beer’.
2.3 Most English vowels have a slight tendency to be pronounced as glides, i.e. the tongue
moves from one position to another nearby. However, most German vowels are
pronounced with the tongue in a constant position.
3 Consonants
3.1 German has one consonant letter not found in English: ß. Called ‘sharp s’ or ‘s-tset’,
this letter is always pronounced voiceless, i.e. as in ‘hiss’ as opposed to ‘his’. It is always
written instead of double -s (ss) when preceded by a long vowel. Thus:
Long: Maße [ma:se] Füße [fü:se] stoße [shto:se] Stöße [shtö:se]Short: Masse [mase] Flüsse [flüse] Sprosse [shprose] Schlösser [shlöser] Hass [has])3.2 Most consonants are pronounced as they are in English, with the following principal
exceptions:
2
LETTERS AND SOUNDS