# Danish Vowel Sounds



## tuckat

Hello all.
It's me again, the wierd Russian always asking questions about Danish. Sorry to bother you all with such silly things.
My Danish pronunciation is getting better and better by the day! My problem is not so much with "a," "e," "i," "y," "æ," or "ø." I can generally pronounce there correctly. My problem is with "o," "u," and "å." It is difficult for me, for example, to understand why the word "god" sound as though it is written with a "u," or maybe there is something that I'm missing? It's difficult for me to make a difference between o and u, and å to me sounds just like o sometimes! I feel like I have a pretty good ear, but this seems to have me stumped.
If anybody could perhaps offer some advice regarding these vowel or even better provide an accurate IPA for these vowels, I would be so appriciative. 
Also, I'm speaking strickly about long vowels, short vowels do not seem to bother me as much.
Tak skal I have. Jeg kan ikke tale dansk meget godt, men det bliver bedre og bedre hver dag!


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## hanne

No reason to be sorry, I'm happy that we get questions in Danish now and then - we're usually outnumbered by Swedish and Norwegian. But why do the Danish questions have to be so tough? 

I suppose you've already looked at various wikipedia pages? At least there's plenty of IPA (which I can't do).

I don't quite understand why you would think that "god" sounds like "gud" - that sounds more like a problem somebody would have with Swedish or Norwegian, whereas I think Danish pretty much follows the "standard European trend" for these sounds (that's my impression, I could be wrong, phonology isn't one of my specialties).

"å" is a standard problem for learners of Danish, afaik, if that's any consolation...


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## frugihoyi

hanne said:


> But why do the Danish questions have to be so tough?


 Because your language is tough!

To me "god" sounds like "gou," dvs. it has two vowel sounds, while a word like "gud" only has the "u" sound.


I hope that helps you. That's the way I see it coming from a Portuguese speaking background, and I do think that Portuguese and Russian sound very alike in their sounds (of course the words are completely different).


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## Lugubert

My non-native view: You’re quite right in often hearing written <o> and <å> as IPA [o]. Likewise, the <u> are often . But, <god> ‘good’ is [guð]. If you believe in her or not, I think <gud> ‘God’ also is [guð]. 

  But a much worse problem is getting the ”stød” correctly. I live just a couple of hours’ ferry ride from Denmark, and have my father’s family in the very SW of Sweden, but I often feel out of my depth on that feature.


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## frugihoyi

Lugubert said:


> My non-native view: You’re quite right in often hearing written <o> and <å> as IPA [o]. Likewise, the <u> are often . But, <god> ‘good’ is [guð]. If you believe in her or not, I think <gud> ‘God’ also is [guð].
> 
> But a much worse problem is getting the ”stød” correctly. I live just a couple of hours’ ferry ride from Denmark, and have my father’s family in the very SW of Sweden, but I often feel out of my depth on that feature.



 "god" and "gud" definitely don't sound the same.


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## hanne

Lugubert said:


> My non-native view: You’re quite right in often hearing written <o> and <å> as IPA [o]. Likewise, the <u> are often . But, <god> ‘good’ is [guð]. If you believe in her or not, I think <gud> ‘God’ also is [guð].



You're right about o and å, that they can sound the same ("hoppe" and "sådan" have the same vowel-sound, but it isn't [o], rather something like [ʌ] or [ɔ] (my IPA isn't the best...)). I can't think of any examples of å being pronounced anything like [o]...

And "god" isn't [guð], we don't have the same vowel sounds for o, u, y as you do in Swedish . The o in god is pretty much like the French au, which is [o] I think.
And while we're around French, actually the u in gud is more or less the same as French ou, so hopefully that can help answer the original question .


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## Sepia

frugihoyi said:


> Because your language is tough!
> 
> To me "god" sounds like "gou," dvs. it has two vowel sounds, while a word like "gud" only has the "u" sound.
> 
> 
> I hope that helps you. That's the way I see it coming from a Portuguese speaking background, and I do think that Portuguese and Russian sound very alike in their sounds (of course the words are completely different).


 
Don't see how you came up with that "gou"-sound. The end-consonant of "god" is definitely the same as the one that ended up being spelled "...th" in English. It is the same sound and was the same for about a thousand years.

Are you talking about some dialect and not standard Danish?


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## frugihoyi

Sepia said:


> Don't see how you came up with that "gou"-sound. The end-consonant of "god" is definitely the same as the one that ended up being spelled "...th" in English. It is the same sound and was the same for about a thousand years.
> 
> Are you talking about some dialect and not standard Danish?


I have no idea what you are talking about. Are you saying that "god" should sound like the English word "goth," but with the "o" of "gold"? Because that is definitely not right and I won't believe you even if you tell me you're Danish.

I think the Danish word "god" sounds almost exactly like the English word "go."


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## hanne

There's a difference here between the "correct" or "proper" pronounciation of god, which ends on ð/th, and which Sepia and I have been talking about, and the more common actual pronounciation which tends to drop the last consonant, which frugihoyi seems to be talking about, and which we write as go' when we need it (as in: Haribo - den er go').

And I suppose I can somehow see how frugihoyi thinks the stød makes it sound like a diphthong, though I'd never describe it that way, and don't find it accurate either...
For a start the "diphthong" of go' is much, much weaker than that of English go.

<<Moderator note: a discussion about the 'd' sound in god has been moved to a separate thread, Danish: Soft d - consontant sound. Please start a new thread for new topics.>>


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