# Swedish: pronunciation of "o"



## modus.irrealis

Hi,

This is as good a time as any for me to start learning how to pronounce Swedish and there are lots of aspects of the spelling that confuse me (maybe I now know what English learners feel like), but to start off, I was wondering if there were any rules for the pronunciation of the letter "o",

Now I (think I) know that "o" represents four sounds that fall into two pairs, there are the long and short o-sounds (like å), and the long and short u-sounds. If this is right, and ignoring the short/long distinction for now, are there any rules to tell you which pair of vowels the "o" represents?

For example, I believe that the plural ending -or represents the the u-sound, but are there any other rules like that, or even better to tell you when an "o" in the root of a word is pronounced which way?


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## María Madrid

modus.irrealis said:


> ignoring the short/long distinction for now, are there any rules...


Sorry to inform you that if you ignore that, you won't get very far: a long "a" (bra) does not sound like a longer version of a short "a" (tack)... All I can say is I took a pronunciation course and I'll always be happy I did and I find it difficult to believe you can really learn so much by just reading. I'll leave the rest of your question for the natives.


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## modus.irrealis

María Madrid said:


> Sorry to inform you that if you ignore that, you won't get very far: a long "a" (bra) does not sound like a longer version of a short "a" (tack)... All I can say is I took a pronunciation course and I'll always be happy I did and I find it difficult to believe you can really learn so much by just reading. I'll leave the rest of your question for the natives.


I just meant ignoring the length distinction for the purposes of my question because I wanted to know whether there's any way to tell which pair of sounds "o" refers to. I asked it this way because I already know some of ways the long/short distinction is made in writing (for example, double consonants normally indicate that the preceding vowel is short). And just to be clear, it's not the actual pronunciation itself I'm interested in (I agree with you that this is something that's learned by best by hearing Swedish speakers speak), but I'm trying to understand the logic of the spelling system and how it represents the different sounds.


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## Tjahzi

Hello.

I'm sorry, but I'm afraid this "key" to decode the Swedish spelling system that you are asking for is not to be found. Apart from the now rather rudimental dubbel consonants, there is no way to really tell whether a vowel is long or short. Although being preceeded by two consonants usually means a vowel is short, there are too many exceptions from this rule to real call it a rule, except for maybe the few occasions where the dubbeling of a consonant is the last outpost separating an otherwise minimal pair, such as "hatt" ("hat") and "hat" ("hatred").

Anyhow, since you were mainly asking about "o", I'll try to answer that question. However, you do confuse me a bit here. "O" represents four different sounds? Two pair of sounds? Hm, I'm not sure I follow here. As far as I know, "o", like pretty much all Swedish vowels, only has a long and a short form. This link will hopefully clear that up. 

Well, if your question was how they are differentiated in written language, there is not much of an answer to give. If it was something else, please specify.


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## modus.irrealis

Tjahzi said:


> I'm sorry, but I'm afraid this "key" to decode the Swedish spelling system that you are asking for is not to be found.


Oh well -- it would've been nice to have, but not having it is not the worst thing in the world .



> Apart from the now rather rudimental dubbel consonants, there is no way to really tell whether a vowel is long or short. Although being preceeded by two consonants usually means a vowel is short, there are too many exceptions from this rule to real call it a rule, except for maybe the few occasions where the dubbeling of a consonant is the last outpost separating an otherwise minimal pair, such as "hatt" ("hat") and "hat" ("hatred").


Maybe "rule" is too strong a word but even as a tendency it's helpful for me. It reminds me of some of the features of English spelling which are not perfect but they're not useless either.



> However, you do confuse me a bit here. "O" represents four different sounds? Two pair of sounds? Hm, I'm not sure I follow here. As far as I know, "o", like pretty much all Swedish vowels, only has a long and a short form. This link will hopefully clear that up.


In the grammar book I have, there are examples like

_ko_ - long u-sound
_ost_ - short u-sound
_son_ - long o-sound
_som_ - short o-sound

The lexin dictionary online also indicates four different pronunciations and it was those four sounds I was thinking of. Am I misunderstanding something?


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## Wilma_Sweden

modus.irrealis said:


> _ko_ - long u-sound
> _ost_ - short u-sound
> _son_ - long o-sound
> _som_ - short o-sound



Alas, like us poor English learners, you have to learn the pronunciation and the spelling by way of dictionaries - there is no sure way of telling!

A very generalised tendency might be: long sound before single consonants, short sound before multiple consonants (*som* excepted, of course....) 

Words with nordic/germanic etymology tend to have the u-sound, while words borrowed from Latin, French, Greek or English, are more likely to have the o-sound. In those words, the vowel sound is usuallly short in unstressed syllables, long in stressed syllables: ekon*o*m (1st short, 2nd long). NB: The Latin suffix -ion is always pronounced with u-sound, again, long for stressed syllables, short for unstressed syllables: nati*o*n, nationalsång (1st long, 2nd short)

That's all I can think of. It might lead you to an educated guess how to pronounce them, but that's all. If in doubt, look it up!

/Wilma


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## modus.irrealis

Wilma, thank you. Those are the kinds of tips I was hoping for.


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## Tjahzi

I looked into the confusion regarding "o" and you are indeed correct, there are four ways to pronounce it. However, two of those (irronically those we have been refering to as "o-sounds") are overlapping with the pronounciation of "å". Whether we are at the early stages of a merging between "å" and "o" or if this letter (the "o" with the "å-like" pronounciation) occurs due to change in pronounciation of induvidual words, I do not dare to say.

Wilma pointed out some guidelines for determining which sounds was presents. However, I feel that I have to question her conclusions/informations regarding the origin of a word influencing its pronounciation (On a side note, how did you come up with your answer, anaylizis of your own or do you have a link? (I'd love to have it)). Also, what makes you differentiate between _"words nordic/germanic etymology"_ and "borrowed words" including those from English? I would say English borrowings belong to the former group aswell, and if not, then they are not really English, right?

Furthermore, I find it hard to believe that such a distinction can be made given the amount of evidence against it. For instance, wouldn't "son" (Eng: "son", De: "Sohn", Nl: "zoon") be a very Germanic word? Just like "att komma" (Eng: "to come", De: "zu kommen", Nl: "te komen"), "att sova" (Eng: "to sleep", De: "zu schlafen", Nl: "te slapen"), "att hoppas" (Eng: "to hope", De: "zu hoffen", Nl: "te hopen")? Yet they are pronounced with the "o-sound".

Meanwhile, words such as "kolera" ("cholera", borrowed from Greek via Latin via English) and "situation" ("situation", from French) are pronounced with the "u-sound".

However, as I was investigating this, it appeared to me that there are words in which no distinction is made! That is, one may opt to go for either the "o-sound" or "u-sound" and neither is incorrect. In fact, this appears to be fairly common.

To sum up, I do not believe one can turn to etymology when trying to determine whether "o" is pronounced as an "o-sound" or "u-sound". There are however, as Wilma points out, ways to determine whether the vowel in question (may it be an "o-sound" or an "u-sound") is long or short. But this wasn't really what you were asking for, or?

Conclusion, I've realized what your initial question was about but I'm still afraid there is no satisfying answer to tell when an "o" is pronounced "o/å" or "u/o", except from the fact that the "u/o" pronounciation is more common (since there is another way to express "o/å", namely "å").


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## modus.irrealis

Tjahzi said:


> Conclusion, I've realized what your initial question was about but I'm still afraid there is no satisfying answer to tell when an "o" is pronounced "o/å" or "u/o", except from the fact that the "u/o" pronounciation is more common (since there is another way to express "o/å", namely "å").


I realize you're right with warning me to not expect some simple rule to work in all cases, but satisfying for me does not mean perfect -- even something that works more often than not would make me happy -- I'm not being very demanding here .

Wilma's comments in fact remind me of how the letter "u" works which can represent a variety of sound and there too there is a tendency for Latinate words to have a certain pronunciation.


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## Tjahzi

Well, my point was that there is in fact no connection between the etymology of a word and the way "o" is pronounced. I brought up a few examples above suggesting that was the case. The only strict rule I would dare backing is that the "u" pronounciation is the (clearly) most common. But it ends right there.

However, as mentioned above, there are certain indicators of whether a vowel is short or long, not many and not very coherent ones, but some. But that was not what you were asking for, right?


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## Wilma_Sweden

Tjahzi said:


> (On a side note, how did you come up with your answer, anaylizis of your own or do you have a link? (I'd love to have it)).


Analysis of my own by browsing dictionary (NE) for words containing o. I never said it was a hard and fast rule, but I did believe I saw a tendency that could form a basis for an educated guess, i.e. increasing the chances of getting it right. 


> Also, what makes you differentiate between _"words nordic/germanic etymology"_ and "borrowed words" including those from English? I would say English borrowings belong to the former group aswell, and if not, then they are not really English, right?


"borrowed words" = imports from German, French, Latin, Greek, Arab and English, most of which have happened from the 15th century onwards. Recent imports from English may have Latin etymology, but from the Swedish point of view, the nearest point of origin is English. (e.g. silikon)


> Meanwhile, words such as "kolera" ("cholera", borrowed from Greek via Latin via English) and "situation" ("situation", from French) are pronounced with the "u-sound".


I did dedicate a whole sentence to the -ion suffix as an exception, and again, the whole thing was meant as a rough guide.



> However, as I was investigating this, it appeared to me that there are words in which no distinction is made! That is, one may opt to go for either the "o-sound" or "u-sound" and neither is incorrect. In fact, this appears to be fairly common.


 Example?

/Wilma


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## Tjahzi

Wilma_Sweden said:


> Analysis of my own by browsing dictionary (NE) for words containing o. I never said it was a hard and fast rule, but I did believe I saw a tendency that could form a basis for an educated guess, i.e. increasing the chances of getting it right.


 
Ok, I see. I'm not attacking you personally, I just haven't found satifying proof for this theory myself.



Wilma_Sweden said:


> "borrowed words" = imports from German, French, Latin, Greek, Arab and English, most of which have happened from the 15th century onwards. Recent imports from English may have Latin etymology, but from the Swedish point of view, the nearest point of origin is English. (e.g. silikon)


 
I'm well aware of what the concept of word borrowing involves, however, it appeared contradictive to me to talk about English borrowings as opposed to germanic words. Meanwhile, Swedish hardly borrowed any word _directly_ from Latin or Greek, although that's normally how we refer to them, hence I interpreted that "borrowings from English" would refer to words of English origins, which, considering the alternative category, would be quite contradictive, I'm sure you agree.
However, did you mean to say that borrowings in general are (generally) pronounced with the "o-sound" or just that non-Germanic ones are?



Wilma_Sweden said:


> I did dedicate a whole sentence to the -ion suffix as an exception, and again, the whole thing was meant as a rough guide.


 
Sorry, I missed that one. However, I found some other examples; "kasino", "pilot", "produkt" and "rektor".


Wilma_Sweden said:


> Example?


 
I'm not sure whether this is a dialectal matter, or if it's simply the process of Swedifying the pronounciation of the following words, but I find their pronounciations to be rather incoherent, "omelett", "isolera", "kommun" and "tolerera" (do note that they are all borrowed).


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## Wilma_Sweden

> Ok, I see. I'm not attacking you personally, I just haven't found satifying proof for this theory myself.


Ah, I may have appeared somewhat defensive - I liked my theory but I hadn't prepared its defence very well! 



> However, did you mean to say that borrowings in general are (generally) pronounced with the "o-sound" or just that non-Germanic ones are?


 I would say non-Germanic, in that case, to simplify matters. 



> I'm not sure whether this is a dialectal matter, or if it's simply the process of Swedifying the pronounciation of the following words, but I find their pronounciations to be rather incoherent, "omelett", "isolera", "kommun" and "tolerera" (do note that they are all borrowed).


Out of those four, "kommun" and "tolerans" I pronounce with o-sound, the others with u-sound. I'd say my dialect is typical of Lund, i.e. Scanian, but hardly any diphtongs... Swedifying the o-sound to u-sound might well be what's been happening, although I don't see any definite pattern.

Apart from -ion as already discussed, pro- can be either, while -fon-, -morf-, -log, -stomi are all non-Germanic morfems with o-sound, and they are part of quite a few words... 

I may be waltzing on very thin ice here so, rather than entangling myself and others in further etymological discussions, I shall try to find out whether anyone has published anything on this topic, and if I do find anything, I'll get back here and post it.

/Wilma


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## Tjahzi

No worries.

Just to clarify, my point regarding "omelett", "isolera", "kommun" and "tolerera" was not necessarily that I, myself, pronounce them incorrectly but rather that they _can be_ pronounced in both ways and still be "correct", unlike for example minimal pairs like "mor" and "mår" (that is, if one was to change the way of pronouncing "o" in the four words above, would one get 4 new words without meaning but similarities to the original words, or would nothing change? For instance, if you were to change to "o" in "sko", "bo", "tro" or "motor", a listener would recognize it. Maybe it's just me and my dialect, but to me (and to people around here, I tested yesterday) it seems irrelevant and unnoticeable whether one decides to pronounce "omelett", "isolera", "kommun" and "tolerera" with the "o-" or "u-sound". Just me? 

(I'm asking from a "scientistic" point of view and am just curious and eager to recieve more data to analyze! )


Hm, sorry, but I must ask, you do agree with me about "kasino", "pilot", "produkt" and "rektor" being borrowings pronounced with "u-sound". I reckon you, for good reason, don't like "produkt" so let's replace it with "portmonnä". Originating from French and by me prononced with two "u-sounds".

I've been doing some searching but sadly nothing useful found so far, would be great if you did some too, you seem to do it well.


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## ArnaudC

modus.irrealis said:


> _ko_ - long u-sound
> _ost_ - short u-sound
> _son_ - long o-sound
> _som_ - short o-sound


 
ko and ost sound like in "too" in english, long and short respectively
son is a more open o, like in "zone" in english
som sounds like "son" in english


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## willem81

Hi, All.

I have discovered some rough algorithm to the O-pronunciation on one of the websites:

O pronounces as [ o ] if: O is either in a short (closed) syllable (like in 'komma'), or within a stem before letters -l, -v (like tolk, sova);
O pronounces as [ u ] if : O is either in a long (open) syllable or in the endings -dom, -or.

Can it be reliable for most cases (I see that it doesn't work at least for 'ost')?


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## AutumnOwl

willem81 said:


> or within a stem before letters -l, -v (like tolk, sova)


Do you mean with this that the O is short in both tolk and sova?


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## willem81

Tolk is probably a bad example because it has a closed syllable so there must be a short o-sound anyway, right? Other than that, those rules seem to work?


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## Red Arrow

@Tjahzi: Huh, are there no proper rules for long / short vowels in Swedish? I'm just a beginner, but I always thought it was like this:

-unstressed vowels are pronounced short
-stressed vowels are pronounced short after long consonants and/or clusters (including the M and NG (which sound long) and the X (which is a cluster))
-stessed vowels are pronounced long after short consonants (including the thick RN, RD, RT and RS)
-grammatical endings don't change the vowel length (for example: läsa/läst, skog/skogs, vaken/vakna, seger/segra)

Exceptions:
-words like möln, because it feels more natural to say a long vowel before LN
-some basic words are written with only one N instead of two (kan, man, han, en, etc...) => Is this done to make Swedish spelling look less like Norwegian?

Swedish vowel length actually seems quite easy compared to Danish. (AFAIK)
I am not a linguist so you can correct me if I'm wrong.
I am aware that Swedish isn't 100% logical, but no language is  (and neither should it be)


willem81 said:


> Hi, All.
> 
> I have discovered some rough algorithm to the O-pronunciation on one of the websites:
> 
> O pronounces as [ o ] if: O is either in a short (closed) syllable (like in 'komma'), or within a stem before letters -l, -v (like tolk, sova);
> O pronounces as [ u ] if : O is either in a long (open) syllable or in the endings -dom, -or.
> 
> Can it be reliable for most cases (I see that it doesn't work at least for 'ost')?


This could come in handy. Thanks!


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## AutumnOwl

Red Arrow :D said:


> -some basic words are written with only one N instead of two (kan, man, han, en, etc...)


The word _man _have two different meanings depending if the a is short or long: man - male/one, with a short a, man - mane, with a long a.
_Han _- he, is spelt with one n, the word _hann_ (past form of _hinna_) means to be in time, they are pronounced the same.

There is also the word _dom, _which has three meanings and the o is pronounced in three different ways:
dom - colloquial of de - they, with a short å-sound
dom - judgement, with a short o-sound
dom - cathedral, with a lång å-sound

It's not that easy with Swedish vowel sounds (Finnish vowels are much easier).


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## Red Arrow

AutumnOwl said:


> The word _man _have two different meanings depending if the a is short or long: man - male/one, with a short a, man - mane, with a long a.
> _Han _- he, is spelt with one n, the word _hann_ (past form of _hinna_) means to be in time, they are pronounced the same.
> 
> There is also the word _dom, _which has three meanings and the o is pronounced in three different ways:
> dom - colloquial of de - they, with a short å-sound
> dom - judgement, with a short o-sound
> dom - cathedral, with a lång å-sound
> 
> It's not that easy with Swedish vowel sounds (Finnish vowels are much easier).


Thanks for the clarification 
All of these words follow the ''rules'' I posted earlier, except dom (cathedral), which is probably a German loan word.


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## DerFrosch

Red Arrow :D said:


> -words like möln, because it feels more natural to say a long vowel before LN


"_Möln_" does not exist in Swedish. Maybe you meant "_moln_", where the vowel indeed is long. Also, I don't understand what rule this would be an exception to?


Red Arrow :D said:


> -some basic words are written with only one N instead of two (kan, man, han, en, etc...) => Is this done to make Swedish spelling look less like Norwegian?


I can guarantee you that these spellings have absolutely nothing to do with the Norwegian language. These words have been spelled like this for a long time. I'm afraid I can't give you a good explanation as to why they are spelled this way, although there ought to be one.

In general, I would say the rules you listed are definitely helpful for learners of Swedish - there are certainly exceptions, especially for loan words, but not too many.


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## Red Arrow

DerFrosch said:


> "_Möln_" does not exist in Swedish. Maybe you meant "_moln_", where the vowel indeed is long. Also, I don't understand what rule this would be an exception to?


Yes, I meant moln. I don't know why I wrote möln.
It is an ''exception'' to the 2nd rule. LN is a cluster.


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## DerFrosch

But you wrote:


Red Arrow :D said:


> -stressed vowels are pronounced short *after *long consonants and/or clusters (including the M and NG (which sound long) and the X (which is a cluster))



Here, we have the vowel _in front of_ the cluster, not _after_.


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## Red Arrow

DerFrosch said:


> But you wrote:
> 
> 
> Here, we have the vowel _in front of_ the cluster, not _after_.


That's what I meant. My mind can be quite messy sometimes.
The 3rd rule is wrong too.

I can't edit my previous posts, but this is what I meant:


> -unstressed vowels are pronounced short
> -stressed vowels are pronounced short in front of long consonants and/or clusters (including the M and NG (which sound long) and the X (which is a cluster))
> -stessed vowels are pronounced long in front of short consonants (including the thick RN, RD, RT and RS)
> -grammatical endings don't change the vowel length (for example: läsa/läst, skog/skogs, vaken/vakna, seger/segra)
> 
> Exceptions:
> -words like moln, because it feels more natural to say a long vowel before LN
> -some basic words are written with only one N instead of two (kan, man, han, en, etc...)


Thanks for correcting me.


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