Unsettled Christianity

Unique Traits of the German Alphabet:

• More than 26 letters in the alphabet – German has a so called extended latin alphabet
• The extra letters are ä, ö, ü and ß
• The pronunciation of some of these letters do not exist in the English language
• Several letters are pronounced more from the back of the throat: g, ch, r (though in Austria the r is trilled).
• The W in German sounds like the V in English
• The V in German sounds like the F in English
• Most of the time the S in German sounds like Z in English when placed at the beginning of a word followed by a vowel.
• The letter ß is the only letter that will never be at the beginning of a word.

  Click on the following letters to hear them pronounced. (Audio saved as .wav files.)

  Das Deutsche Alphabet/ The German Alphabet

  Buchstabe/ Letter	Aussprache des Buchstabenamens/ Pronunciation of letter name	Aussprache des Buchstaben – wie in/ Sound of Letter – as in	Beispiele/ Examples
  A a	ah	astronaut	der Adler (eagle), Januar(January)
  B b	approximate: bay	baby	der Bruder (brother), aber (but)
  C c	approximate: tsay	creative, Celcius (soft c sound in German sounds likets)	der Chor, der Christkindlmarkt(south German term for der Weihnachtsmarkt/ Christmas market), Celcius
  D d	approximate: day	dollar	Dienstag (Tuesday), oder (or)
  E e	approximate: ay	elegant	essen (to eat), zuerst (first)
  F f	eff	effort	der Freund (friend), offen (open)
  G g	approximate: gay	gorgeous	gut (good), gemein (mean)
  H h	haa	hammer	der Hammer, dieMühle (mill)
  I i	eeh	Igor	der Igel (porcupine), der Imbiss(snack), sieben (seven)
  J j	yot	yellow	das Jahr (year), jeder (each)
  K k	kah	camel	das Kamel, der Kuchen (cake)
  L l	ell	love	die Leute (people), das Land(land)
  M m	em	man	der Mann, die Ameise
  N n	en	nice	nicht (not), die Münze (coin)
  O o	oh	oven	Ostern (Easter),rot (red)
  P p	approximate: pay	party	die Polizei (police), der Apfel
  Q q	koo	coral	das Quadrat (square), die Quelle(source) Note: All German words start with qu (kw – sound)
  R r	approximate: er	rich	der Rücken (the back), der Stern(star)
  S s	es	zoo, shine, mouse	summen (to hum), schön (pretty, nice), die Maus
  T t	approximate: tay	tyrant	der Tyrann, acht (eight)
  U u	ooh	ou sound in you	die Universität (university), derMund (mouth)
  V v	fow	father	der Vogel (bird), die Nerven(nerves)
  W w	approximate: vay	van	die Wange (cheek), das Schwein(pig, wieviel (how much)
  X x	ix	sounds like kz	das Xylofon/ Xylophon, die Hexe(witch) Note: There are hardly any German words that start with X
  Y y	uep-si-lohn	yellow	die Yucca, der Yeti Note: There are hardly any German words that start with Y.
  Z z	tset	sounds like ts	die Zeitung (newspaper), derZigeuner (gypsy)

  Umlaut + ß

  	Aussprache des Buchstaben/ Pronunciation of Letter	Beispiele/ Examples
  ä	sounds similar to the e in melon	ähnlich (similar), gähnen (to yawn)
  ö	sounds similar to the i in girl	Österreich (Austria), der Löwe(lion)
  ü	no equivalent nor approximate sound in English	über (over),müde (tired)
  ß(esszet)	double s sound	heiß (hot),die Straße (street)

• Learn more specifics of several German letters and their dipthongs in the following articles:
  Pronunciation Part 2
  Pronunciation Part 3
• Starting to feel comfortable with German pronunciation? Put your pronunciation to the test with these Zungenbrecher (tongue twisters).
• More pronunciation practice with these Alphabet Exercises.

Post By Joel L. Watts (9,333 Posts)

Joel L. Watts holds a Masters of Arts from United Theological Seminary with a focus in literary and rhetorical criticism of the New Testament. His interests include exploring the role of mimesis in human civilization, specifically in the study of religion and media, as well as science fiction and the way in which it has allowed mythology to be explored in light of scientific discoveries of the past century. He is the author of Mimetic Criticism of the Gospel of Mark: Introduction and Commentary (Wipf and Stock, 2013) and a co-editor and contributor to From Fear to Faith: Stories of Hitting Spiritual Walls (Energion, 2013).

Website: → Unsettled Christianity

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