Help:IPA/Swedish

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Short description: Wikipedia key to pronunciation

The chart below shows how the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) represents Swedish pronunciations in Wikipedia articles. For a guide to adding IPA characters to Wikipedia articles, see {{IPA-sv}} and Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Pronunciation § Entering IPA characters.

The Sweden pronunciation is based primarily on Central Standard Swedish, and the Finland one on Helsinki pronunciation. Recordings and example transcriptions in this help are in Sweden Swedish, unless otherwise noted.

See Swedish phonology and Swedish alphabet § Sound–spelling correspondences for a more thorough look at the sounds of Swedish.

Consonants
IPA Examples English approximation
Sweden

SWE

Template:Country data Swedish-speaking Finns

FIN

b About this soundbok book
ɕ About this soundkjol, About this soundtjock, About this soundkön sheep or cheat
d About this sounddop dad
ɖ rd About this soundnord[1] retroflex /d/
f About this soundfot foot
ɡ About this soundgod good
h About this soundhot hat
ɧ ʃ About this soundsju, About this soundstjärna, About this soundskör, About this soundstation, About this soundpension, About this soundgeni, About this soundchoklad[2] somewhat like Scottish loch or sheep (varies regionally)
j About this soundjord, About this soundgenom, About this soundGöteborg yoyo
k About this soundkon cone
l About this soundlov lack
ɭ rl About this soundrl[1] retroflex /l/
m About this soundmod mode
n About this soundnod node
ɳ rn About this soundbarn[1] retroflex /n/
ŋ About this soundng long
p About this soundpol pole
r About this soundrov[3] somewhat like American water or Scottish rose
s About this soundsot soot
ʂ rs About this soundtorsdag[1] retroflex /ʃ/, somewhat like shrine
t About this soundtok tool
ʈ rt About this soundparti[1] retroflex /t/
v About this soundvåt vote
Rare sounds
IPA Examples English approximation
w Wales Wales
Zlatan, Bratislava father
Vowels
IPA Examples English approximation
Sweden

SWE

Template:Country data Swedish-speaking Finns

FIN

a ɑ About this soundmatt cut
ɑː About this soundmat bra
æ About this soundvärk, About this soundverk[4] trap
æː About this soundära[4] ham
About this soundfet mayor
ɛ e About this soundhäll, About this soundfett sell
ɛː About this soundhäl RP pair
ɪ i About this soundsill hit
About this soundsil leave
ɔ o About this soundmoll[5] off
About this soundmål[5] floor
œ ø About this soundnött[5] somewhat like hurt
œ About this soundbörja[4][5]
œː About this soundöra[4][5] somewhat like herd
øː About this soundnöt[5]
ɵ ʉ About this soundfull, About this soundmusik[5][6] moot
ʉ duell,
känguru[5][6][7]
ʉː About this soundful[5][8] mood
ʊ u About this soundbott[5] put
About this soundbot[5] fool
ʏ y About this soundsyll[5][7] somewhat like cute
About this soundsyl[5][8] somewhat like cube
Suprasegmentals
IPA Examples Explanation
Sweden

SWE

Template:Country data Swedish-speaking Finns

FIN

ˈ◌̌ ˈ◌ anden
[ˈǎnːdɛn]
'the duck'
tone 1 / acute accent:[9]
  • rising-falling tone in Stockholm: About this sound[ˈǎnːdɛ̂n]
  • low-rising tone in Gothenburg: [ˈànːdɛ̌n]
  • falling-low tone in Malmö: [ˈânːdɛ̀n]
ˈ◌̂ anden
[ˈânːdɛn]
'the spirit'
tone 2 / grave accent:[9]
  • falling-falling tone in Stockholm: About this sound[ˈânːdɛ̂n]
  • falling-rising tone in Gothenburg: [ˈânːdɛ̌n]
  • rising-falling tone in Malmö: [ˈǎnːdɛ̂n]
ˌ Oxenstierna
[ˈʊ̂ksɛnˌɧæːɳa]
secondary stress, as in intonation
ː Helsingfors
About this sound[hɛlsɪŋˈfɔʂː]
geminated consonant: fresh shrimp[10]

Notes

  1. 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 1.4 In many of the dialects that have an apical rhotic consonant, a recursive sandhi process of retroflexion occurs, and clusters of /r/ and dental consonants /rd/, /rl/, /rn/, /rs/, /rt/ produce retroflex consonant realisations: [ɖ], [ɭ], [ɳ], [ʂ], [ʈ]. In dialects with a guttural R, such as Southern Swedish, they are [ʁd], [ʁl], [ʁn], [ʁs], [ʁt]. In Finland Swedish, retroflexion might only occur in some varieties, especially among young speakers and in fast speech.
  2. Sweden Swedish /ɧ/ varies regionally and is sometimes [], [ɸˠ], or [ʂ].
  3. /r/ varies considerably in different dialects: it is pronounced alveolar or similarly (a trilled r when articulated clearly or in slow or formal speech; in normal speech, usually a tapped r or an alveolar approximant) in virtually all dialects (most consistently [r] in Finland), but in South Swedish dialects, it is uvular, similar to the Parisian French r. At the beginning of a syllable, it can also be pronounced as a fricative [ʐ], similar to in English genre or vision.
  4. 4.0 4.1 4.2 4.3 Before /r/, the quality of non-high front vowels is changed: the unrounded vowels /ɛ/ and /ɛː/ are lowered to [æ] and [æː], whereas the rounded /œ/ and /øː/ are lowered to open-mid [œ] and [œː]. For simplicity, no distinction is made between the mid [œ˔] and the open-mid [œ], with both being transcribed as ⟨œ⟩. Note that younger speakers use lower allophones [ɶ] and [ɶː].
  5. 5.00 5.01 5.02 5.03 5.04 5.05 5.06 5.07 5.08 5.09 5.10 5.11 5.12 In Sweden, [ɔ, , œ, œː, øː, ʏ, ] are protruded vowels, while [ɵ, ʉ, ʉː, ʊ, ] are compressed. Instead, [œ, œː, ø, øː, ʉ, ʉː, y, ] are compressed, while only [o, , u, ] are protruded in Finland. This makes Finland Swedish [y] and [yː] sound closer to Sweden Swedish [ʉ] and [ʉː], which are also fronted, rather than to their respective counterparts.
  6. 6.0 6.1 [ɵ] and [ʉ] are the Sweden Swedish unstressed allophones of a single phoneme /ɵ/ (stressed /ɵ/ is always realized as [ɵ]):
    • [ɵ] is used in all closed syllables (as in kultur About this sound[kɵlˈtʉːr]) but also in some open syllables, as in musikal [mɵsɪˈkɑːl]. Some cases involve resyllabification caused by retroflexion, which makes the syllable open, as in kurtisan [kɵʈɪˈsɑːn];
    • [ʉ] appears only in open syllables. In some cases, [ʉ] is the only possible realization, as in känguru [ˈɕɛ̌ŋːɡʉrʉ], such as when /ɵ/ appears in hiatus, as in duell [dʉˈɛlː];
    • In other cases, [ɵ] is in free variation with [ʉ] so musik can be pronounced as About this sound[mɵˈsiːk] or [mʉˈsiːk] (Riad (2014:28-29)). For simplicity, only ⟨ɵ⟩ will be used.
  7. 7.0 7.1 The distinction between compressed [ʉ] and protruded [ʏ] is particularly difficult to hear for non-native speakers:
    • Sweden Swedish compressed [ʉ] sounds very close to German compressed [ʏ] (as in müssen About this sound[ˈmʏsn̩]);
    • Sweden Swedish protruded [ʏ] sounds more similar to English unrounded [ɪ] (as in hit) than to German compressed [ʏ], and it is very close to Norwegian protruded [ʏ] (as in nytt [nʏtː]).
  8. 8.0 8.1 The distinction between compressed [ʉː] and protruded [] is particularly difficult to hear for non-native speakers:
    • Sweden Swedish compressed [ʉː] sounds very close to German compressed [] (as in üben About this sound[ˈyːbn̩]);
    • Sweden Swedish protruded [yː] sounds more similar to English unrounded [] (as in leave) than to German compressed [yː], and it is very close to Norwegian protruded [yː] (as in lys [lyːs]).
  9. 9.0 9.1 Finland Swedish, as well as a few accents of Mainland Sweden, have a simple primary stress (transcribed as ⟨ˈ⟩) rather than a contrastive pitch accent. In such accents, a word like anden is always pronounced as [ˈɑnːden] regardless of its meaning. The variety of Swedish spoken on the Åland Islands usually resembles phonetically speaking the dialects of the Uppland area rather than other Finland Swedish varieties, but the pitch accent is still largely missing.
  10. Consonants always tend to geminate after a stressed short vowel in Sweden Swedish. In Finland, this is not always true and between vowels usually only happens when the short vowel is followed by an orthographic geminate.

Bibliography

  • Engstrand, Olle (1999), "Swedish", Handbook of the International Phonetic Association: A Guide to the usage of the International Phonetic Alphabet., Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, pp. 140–142, ISBN 0-521-63751-1 
  • Hedelin, Per; Elert, Claes-Christian (1997), Norstedts svenska uttalslexikon, Norstedts, ISBN 91-1-971122-0 
  • Reuter, Mikael (1971), "Vokalerna i finlandsvenska: En instrumentell analys och ett försök till systematisering enligt särdrag" (in Swedish), Studier i nordisk filologi (Svenska litteratursällskapet i Finland) 46: 240–249 
  • Riad, Tomas (2014), The Phonology of Swedish, Oxford University Press, ISBN 978-0-19-954357-1 

External links