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The phonology of Standard German is the standard pronunciation or accent of the
German language German ( ) is a West Germanic language mainly spoken in Central Europe. It is the most widely spoken and official or co-official language in Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Liechtenstein, and the Italian province of South Tyrol. It is also a ...
. It deals with current
phonology Phonology is the branch of linguistics that studies how languages or dialects systematically organize their sounds or, for sign languages, their constituent parts of signs. The term can also refer specifically to the sound or sign system of a ...
and
phonetics Phonetics is a branch of linguistics that studies how humans produce and perceive sounds, or in the case of sign languages, the equivalent aspects of sign. Linguists who specialize in studying the physical properties of speech are phoneticians. ...
as well as with historical developments thereof as well as the geographical variants and the influence of
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. While the spelling of German is officially standardised by an international organisation (the Council for German Orthography) the pronunciation has no official standard and relies on a ''de facto'' standard documented in reference works such as (German Pronunciation Dictionary) by Eva-Maria Krech et al., (Duden volume 6, The Pronunciation Dictionary) by
Max Mangold Max Mangold (; 8 May 1922 – 3 February 2015) was a Swiss-German linguist and phonetician. He was born in the village of Pratteln near Basel, Switzerland and taught phonetics, phonology and linguistic theory at the University of the Saarland i ...
and the training materials of radio and television stations such as ''
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'', ''
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'', or ''
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''. This standardised pronunciation was invented, rather than coming from any particular German-speaking city. But the pronunciation that Germans usually consider to be closest to the standard is that of
Hanover Hanover (; german: Hannover ; nds, Hannober) is the capital and largest city of the German state of Lower Saxony. Its 535,932 (2021) inhabitants make it the 13th-largest city in Germany as well as the fourth-largest city in Northern Germany ...
. Standard German is sometimes referred to as (stage German), but the latter has its own definition and is slightly different.


Vowels


Monophthongs

Some scholarsSee the discussions in and treat as an unstressed
allophone In phonology, an allophone (; from the Greek , , 'other' and , , 'voice, sound') is a set of multiple possible spoken soundsor ''phones''or signs used to pronounce a single phoneme in a particular language. For example, in English, (as in '' ...
of . Likewise, some scholars treat as an allophone of the unstressed sequence . The phonemic status of is also debated – see below.


Notes

* Close vowels ** is close front unrounded .See the vowel charts in . ** is close near-front rounded . ** is close back rounded . ** has been variously described as near-close front unrounded and near-close near-front unrounded . ** is near-close near-front rounded . ** is near-close near-back rounded . * Mid vowels ** is close-mid front unrounded . *** In non-standard accents of the Low German speaking area, as well as in some Bavarian and Austrian accents it may be pronounced as a narrow closing diphthong . ** has been variously described as close-mid near-front rounded and mid near-front rounded . *** In non-standard accents of the Low German speaking area, as well as in some Austrian accents it may be pronounced as a narrow closing diphthong . ** is close-mid back rounded . *** In non-standard accents of the Low German speaking area, as well as in some Austrian accents it may be pronounced as a narrow closing diphthong . ** has been variously described as mid central unrounded . and close-mid central unrounded . It occurs only in unstressed syllables, for instance in ('occupy'). It is often considered a complementary allophone together with , which only rarely occurs in unstressed syllables (e.g. ). If a
sonorant In phonetics and phonology, a sonorant or resonant is a speech sound that is produced with continuous, non-turbulent airflow in the vocal tract; these are the manners of articulation that are most often voiced in the world's languages. Vowels ar ...
follows in the
syllable coda A syllable is a unit of organization for a sequence of speech sounds typically made up of a syllable nucleus (most often a vowel) with optional initial and final margins (typically, consonants). Syllables are often considered the phonological " ...
, the schwa often disappears so that the sonorant becomes syllabic, for instance ('pillow'), ('donkey'). ** has been variously described as mid near-front unrounded and open-mid front unrounded . ** has been variously described as mid front unrounded and open-mid front unrounded . ** has been variously described as open-mid near-front rounded and somewhat lowered open-mid near-front rounded . ** has been variously described as somewhat fronted open-mid back rounded and open-mid back rounded . * Open vowels ** is near-open central unrounded . It is a common allophone of the sequence common to all German-speaking areas but Switzerland. As schwa is never pronounced here, it may be more appropriate to interpret as the vocalised allophone of the consonant /r/. ** has been variously described as open front unrounded and open central unrounded . Some scholars differentiate two short , namely front and back . The latter occurs only in unstressed open syllables, exactly as . *** Standard Austrian pronunciation of this vowel is back . *** Front or even is a common realization of in northern German varieties influenced by
Low German : : : : : (70,000) (30,000) (8,000) , familycolor = Indo-European , fam2 = Germanic , fam3 = West Germanic , fam4 = North Sea Germanic , ancestor = Old Saxon , ancestor2 = Middle ...
. ** has been variously described as open central unrounded and open back unrounded . Because of this, it is sometimes transcribed . *** Back is the Standard Austrian pronunciation. It is also a common realization of in northern German varieties influenced by
Low German : : : : : (70,000) (30,000) (8,000) , familycolor = Indo-European , fam2 = Germanic , fam3 = West Germanic , fam4 = North Sea Germanic , ancestor = Old Saxon , ancestor2 = Middle ...
(in which it may even be rounded ). ** notes that "there is a tendency to neutralize the distinction between , , and . That is, , , and have final syllables which are perceptually very similar, and are nearly or completely identical in some dialects." He also says that "outside of a word context, cannot be distinguished from . (As early as 1847, Verdi's librettist found it natural, when adapting a play by Schiller into the Italian language, to render the distinctly German name ''Roller'' as ''Rolla''.) Although there is also a length contrast, vowels are often analyzed according to a tenseness contrast, with long being the tense vowels and short their lax counterparts. Like the English checked vowels, the German lax vowels require a following consonant, with the notable exception of (which is absent in many varieties, as discussed below). is sometimes considered the lax counterpart of tense in order to maintain this tense/lax division. Short occur in unstressed syllables of
loanwords A loanword (also loan word or loan-word) is a word at least partly assimilated from one language (the donor language) into another language. This is in contrast to cognates, which are words in two or more languages that are similar because th ...
, for instance in ('psychometry'). They are usually considered
allophone In phonology, an allophone (; from the Greek , , 'other' and , , 'voice, sound') is a set of multiple possible spoken soundsor ''phones''or signs used to pronounce a single phoneme in a particular language. For example, in English, (as in '' ...
s of tense vowels, which cannot occur in unstressed syllables (unless in compounds). Northern German varieties influenced by Low German could be analyzed as lacking contrasting vowel quantity entirely: * has a different quality than (see above). * These varieties also consistently lack , and use only in its place.


Phonemic status of

The long open-mid front unrounded vowel does not exist in many varieties of Standard German and is rendered as the close-mid front unrounded vowel , so that both ('ear of grain') and ('honor') are pronounced (instead of "Ähre" being ) and both ('bears') and ('berries') are pronounced (instead of being ). However, the disputed vowel seems much more stable in other contexts, i.e., not preceding /r/ as in the examples above. Other relevant minimal pairs include ''beten'' ('pray') - ''bäten'' ('bid, conjunctive'), ''dehnen'' ('stretch') - ''Dänen'' ('Danes'), ''Segen'' ('blessing') - ''Sägen'' ('saws, n.'). It has been debated whether is a distinct phoneme or even exists, except when consciously self-censoring speech, for several reasons: # The existence of a phoneme is an irregularity in a vowel system that otherwise has pairs of long and tense vs. short and lax vowels such as vs. . On the other hand, such irregularities are not ruled out by any principle. # Although some dialects (e.g. Ripuarian and some Alemannic dialects) have an opposition of vs. , there is little agreement across dialects as to whether individual lexical items should be pronounced with or with . # The use of is a spelling pronunciation rather than an original feature of the language. It is an attempt to "speak as printed" () and to differentiate the spellings and (i.e. speakers attempt to justify the appearance of and in writing by making them distinct in the spoken language). # Speakers with an otherwise fairly standard
idiolect Idiolect is an individual's unique use of language, including speech. This unique usage encompasses vocabulary, grammar, and pronunciation. This differs from a dialect, a common set of linguistic characteristics shared among a group of people ...
find it rather difficult to utter longer passages with and in the right places. Such persons apparently have to picture the spellings of the words in question, which impedes the flow of speech. However, the examples above with a non-rhotic context for the disputed vowel distinction speak against this view.


Diphthongs


Phonemic

* has been variously described as ,Source: . On the page 14, the author states that , and are of the same quality as vowels of which they consist. On the page 8, he states that is low central. See vowel chart in . Despite their true ending points, Kohler still transcribes them as , i.e. with higher offsets than those actually have. and . * has been variously described as , , and . * has been variously described as , , , , and . * is found only in a handful of interjections such as and , and as an alternative to disyllabic in words such as .


Phonetic

The following usually are not counted among the German diphthongs as German speakers often feel they are distinct marks of "foreign words" (). These appear only in loanwords: * , as in , colloquially: . * Many German speakers use and as adaptations of the English diphthongs and in English loanwords, according to , or they replace them with the native German long vowels and . Thus, the word may be pronounced or . However, and do not recognize these diphthongs as phonemes, and prescribe pronunciations with the long vowels and instead. In the varieties where speakers vocalize to in the syllable coda, a diphthong ending in may be formed with every stressable vowel: : notes that the length contrast is not very stable before non-prevocalic and that ", following the pronouncing dictionaries (, ) judge the vowel in , , to be long, while the vowel in , , is supposed to be short. The factual basis of this presumed distinction seems very questionable." He goes on stating that in his own dialect, there is no length difference in these words, and that judgements on vowel length in front of non-prevocalic which is itself vocalized are problematic, in particular if precedes. :According to the "lengthless" analysis, the aforementioned "long" diphthongs are analyzed as , , , , , , and . This makes non-prevocalic and homophonous as or . Non-prevocalic and may also merge, but the vowel chart in shows that they have somewhat different starting points – mid-centralized open-mid front for the former, open-mid front for the latter. : also states that "laxing of the vowel is predicted to take place in shortened vowels; it does indeed seem to go hand in hand with the vowel shortening in many cases." This leads to , , , , , being pronounced the same as , , , , , . This merger is usual in the Standard Austrian accent, in which e.g. 'bog' is often pronounced ; this, in contrast with the Standard Northern variety, also happens intervocalically, along with the diphthongization of the laxed vowel to , so that e.g. 'teacher' is pronounced (the corresponding Standard Northern pronunciation is ). Another feature of the Standard Austrian accent is complete absorption of by the preceding , so that e.g. 'scarce' is pronounced .


Consonants

With around 22 to 26 phonemes, the German consonant system has an average number of consonants in comparison with other languages. One of the more noteworthy ones is the unusual
affricate An affricate is a consonant that begins as a stop and releases as a fricative, generally with the same place of articulation (most often coronal). It is often difficult to decide if a stop and fricative form a single phoneme or a consonant pai ...
. * can be uvular, alveolar or even dental, a consonant or a semivowel, see below. * is bilabial–labiodental , rather than purely labiodental . * can be apical alveolar ,
laminal A laminal consonant is a phone (speech sound) produced by obstructing the air passage with the blade of the tongue, the flat top front surface just behind the tip of the tongue in contact with upper lip, teeth, alveolar ridge, to possibly, as ...
alveolar or laminal
denti-alveolar In linguistics, a denti-alveolar consonant or dento-alveolar consonant is a consonant that is articulated with a flat tongue against the alveolar ridge and the upper teeth, such as and in languages such as French, Italian and Spanish. That is, ...
. The other possible pronunciation of that has been reported to occur in unstressed intervocalic positions is retroflex . Austrian German often uses the laminal denti-alveolar articulation. ** is always clear , as in most
Irish English Hiberno-English (from Latin language, Latin ''Hibernia'': "Ireland"), and in ga, Béarla na hÉireann. or Irish English, also formerly Anglo-Irish, is the set of English dialects native to the island of Ireland (including both the Repub ...
accents. A few Austrian accents may use a velarized instead, but that is considered non-standard. *In the Standard Austrian variety, may be affricated to before front vowels. * can be laminal alveolar ,. This source talks only about . This source talks only about . laminal post-dental (i.e. fronted alveolar, articulated with the blade of the tongue just behind upper front teeth), or even apical alveolar . Austrian German often uses the post-dental articulation. are always strongly fricated. * are strongly labialized palato-alveolar sibilants . are fricated more weakly than . There are two variants of these sounds: **Laminal, articulated with the foremost part of the blade of the tongue approaching the foremost part of the hard palate, with the tip of the tongue resting behind either upper or lower front teeth. **Apico-laminal, articulated with the tip of the tongue approaching the gums and the foremost part of the blade approaching the foremost part of the hard palate. According to , this variant is used more frequently. * has a number of possible realizations: ** Voiced apical coronal trill , either alveolar (articulated with the tip of the tongue against the alveolar ridge), or dental (articulated with the tip of the tongue against the back of the upper front teeth). *** Distribution: Common in the south (Bavaria and many parts of Switzerland and Austria), but it is also found in some speakers in central and northern Germany, especially the elderly. It is also one of possible realizations of in the Standard Austrian accent, but a more common alveolar realization is an approximant . Even more common are uvular realizations, fricatives and a trill .: "SAG features a wide variety of realizations of the trill. In approximately the past 40 years, the pronunciation norm has changed from an alveolar to a uvular trill. The latter is mostly pronounced as a fricative, either voiced or voiceless. Alveolar trills are still in use, mostly pronounced as an approximant. ** Voiced uvular trill , which can be realized as voiceless after voiceless consonants (as in ). According to it is often a flap intervocalically (as in ). *** Distribution: Occurs in some conservative varieties - most speakers with a uvular realize it as a fricative or an approximant. It is also one of possible realizations of in the Standard Austrian accent, but it is less common than a fricative . ** Dorsal continuant, about the quality of which there is not a complete agreement: *** describe two fricative variants, namely post-palatal and velar . The post-palatal variant appears before and after
front vowel A front vowel is a class of vowel sounds used in some spoken languages, its defining characteristic being that the highest point of the tongue is positioned as far forward as possible in the mouth without creating a constriction that would otherw ...
s, while the velar variant is used in all other positions. *** describe it as voiced post-velar fricative . *** and describe it as voiced uvular fricative ; **** states that "with educated professional radio and TV announcers, as with professional actors on the stage and in film, the oiced uvularfricative ealization of clearly predominates." ***** In the Standard Austrian accent, the uvular fricative is also the most common realization, although its voicing is variable (that is, it can be either voiced or voiceless ). **** writes that "the place of articulation of the consonant varies from uvular in e.g. ('red') to velar in e.g. ('kick'), depending on back or front vowel contexts." He also notes that is devoiced after voiceless plosives and fricatives, especially those within the same word, giving the word as an example. According to this author, can be reduced to an approximant in an intervocalic position. *** describe it as a uvular fricative or approximant . The latter is less likely to occur word-initially. *** Distribution: Almost all areas apart from Bavaria and parts of Switzerland. ** Near-open central unrounded vowel is a post-vocalic allophone of (mostly dorsal) varieties of . The non-syllabic variant of it is not always near-open or central; it is similar to either or , depending on the environment. *** Distribution: Widespread, but less common in Switzerland. *The voiceless stops , , are aspirated except when preceded by a sibilant. Many southern dialects do not aspirate , and some northern ones do so only in a stressed position. The voiceless affricates , , and are never aspirated, and neither are any other consonants besides the aforementioned . *The obstruents are voiceless lenis in southern varieties, and they contrast with voiceless fortis . *In Austria, intervocalic can be lenited to fricatives . *Before and after front vowels ( and, in varieties that realize them as front, and/or ), the velar consonants are realized as post-palatal . According to , in a parallel process, before and after back vowels ( and, in varieties that realize them as back, and/or ) are retracted to post-velar or even uvular . *There is no complete agreement about the nature of ; it has been variously described as: **a fricative , **a fricative which can be fricated less strongly than , **a sound variable between a weak fricative and an approximant, and **an approximant ,. The authors transcribe it as , i.e. as an approximant. which is the usual realization in the Standard Austrian variety. *In many varieties of standard German, the glottal stop, , occurs in careful speech before word stems that begin with a vowel and before stressed vowels word-internally, as in ''Oase'' �o.ʔaː.zə(twice). It is much more frequent in northern varieties than in the south. It is not usually considered a phoneme. In colloquial and dialectal speech, is often omitted, especially when the word beginning with a vowel is unstressed. *The phonemic status of affricates is controversial. The majority view accepts and , but not or the non-native ; some accept none, some accept all but , and some accept all. **Although occurs in native words, it only appears in historic clusters of + (e.g. ''deutsch'' < OHG ''diutisc'') or in words with expressive quality (e.g. ''glitschen'', ''hutschen''). is, however, well-established in loanwords, including German
toponym Toponymy, toponymics, or toponomastics is the study of ''toponyms'' ( proper names of places, also known as place names and geographic names), including their origins, meanings, usage and types. Toponym is the general term for a proper name of ...
s of non-Germanic origin (e.g. '' Zschopau''). ** and occur only in words of foreign origin. In certain varieties, they are replaced by and altogether. * is occasionally considered to be an allophone of , especially in southern varieties of German. * and are traditionally regarded as allophones after front vowels and back vowels, respectively. For a more detailed analysis see below at ''ich-Laut'' and ''ach-Laut''. According to some analyses, is an allophone of after and according to some also after . However, according to , the uvular allophone is used after only in the Standard Austrian variety. *Some phonologists do not posit a separate phoneme and use instead, along with instead of . The phoneme sequence is realized as when can start a valid onset of the next syllable whose nucleus is a vowel other than unstressed , , or . It becomes otherwise. For example: ** ** ** ** ** ~


''Ich-Laut'' and ''ach-Laut''

is the voiceless palatal fricative (which is found in the word 'I'), and is the
voiceless velar fricative The voiceless velar fricative is a type of consonantal sound used in some spoken languages. It was part of the consonant inventory of Old English and can still be found in some dialects of English, most notably in Scottish English, e.g. in ''loc ...
(which is found in the word the interjection 'oh', 'alas'). is the German word for 'sound, phone'. In German, these two sounds are
allophone In phonology, an allophone (; from the Greek , , 'other' and , , 'voice, sound') is a set of multiple possible spoken soundsor ''phones''or signs used to pronounce a single phoneme in a particular language. For example, in English, (as in '' ...
s occurring in complementary distribution. The allophone occurs after back vowels and (for instance in 'book'), the allophone after front vowels (for instance in 'me/myself') and consonants (for instance in 'fear', 'sometimes'). The allophone also appears after vocalized in superregional variants, e.g. in 'fear'. In southeastern regiolects, the is commonly used here, yielding . In
loanword A loanword (also loan word or loan-word) is a word at least partly assimilated from one language (the donor language) into another language. This is in contrast to cognates, which are words in two or more languages that are similar because ...
s, the pronunciation of potential fricatives in onsets of stressed syllables varies: in the Northern varieties of standard German, it is , while in Southern varieties, it is , and in Western varieties, it is (for instance in : vs. vs. ). The
diminutive A diminutive is a root word that has been modified to convey a slighter degree of its root meaning, either to convey the smallness of the object or quality named, or to convey a sense of intimacy or endearment. A ( abbreviated ) is a word-form ...
suffix In linguistics, a suffix is an affix which is placed after the stem of a word. Common examples are case endings, which indicate the grammatical case of nouns, adjectives, and verb endings, which form the conjugation of verbs. Suffixes can carr ...
is always pronounced with an . Usually, this ending triggers umlaut (compare for instance 'dog' to 'little dog'), so theoretically, it could only occur after
front vowel A front vowel is a class of vowel sounds used in some spoken languages, its defining characteristic being that the highest point of the tongue is positioned as far forward as possible in the mouth without creating a constriction that would otherw ...
s. However, in some comparatively recent coinings, there is no longer an umlaut, for instance in the word (a diminutive of 'woman'), so that a back vowel is followed by a , even though normally it would be followed by a , as in ('to smoke'). This exception to the allophonic distribution may be an effect of the morphemic boundary or an example of '' phonemicization'', where erstwhile allophones undergo a split into separate
phoneme In phonology and linguistics, a phoneme () is a unit of sound that can distinguish one word from another in a particular language. For example, in most dialects of English, with the notable exception of the West Midlands and the north-wes ...
s. The allophonic distribution of after front vowels and after other vowels is also found in other languages, such as Scots, in the pronunciation of ''light''. However, it is by no means inevitable: Dutch,
Yiddish Yiddish (, or , ''yidish'' or ''idish'', , ; , ''Yidish-Taytsh'', ) is a West Germanic language historically spoken by Ashkenazi Jews. It originated during the 9th century in Central Europe, providing the nascent Ashkenazi community with a ve ...
, and many Southern German dialects retain (which can be realized as instead) in all positions. It is thus reasonable to assume that
Old High German Old High German (OHG; german: Althochdeutsch (Ahd.)) is the earliest stage of the German language, conventionally covering the period from around 750 to 1050. There is no standardised or supra-regional form of German at this period, and Old Hig ...
''ih'', the ancestor of modern , was pronounced with rather than . While it is impossible to know for certain whether
Old English Old English (, ), or Anglo-Saxon, is the earliest recorded form of the English language, spoken in England and southern and eastern Scotland in the early Middle Ages. It was brought to Great Britain by Anglo-Saxon settlers in the mid-5th ...
words such as ''niht'' (modern ''night'') were pronounced with or , is likely (see
Old English phonology Old English phonology is necessarily somewhat speculative since Old English is preserved only as a written language. Nevertheless, there is a very large corpus of the language, and the orthography apparently indicates phonological alternati ...
). Despite the phonetic history, the complementary distribution of and in modern
Standard German Standard High German (SHG), less precisely Standard German or High German (not to be confused with High German dialects, more precisely Upper German dialects) (german: Standardhochdeutsch, , or, in Switzerland, ), is the standardized variety ...
is better described as backing of after a
back vowel A back vowel is any in a class of vowel sound used in spoken languages. The defining characteristic of a back vowel is that the highest point of the tongue is positioned relatively back in the mouth without creating a constriction that would be c ...
, rather than fronting of after a
front vowel A front vowel is a class of vowel sounds used in some spoken languages, its defining characteristic being that the highest point of the tongue is positioned as far forward as possible in the mouth without creating a constriction that would otherw ...
, because is used in onsets ( 'chemistry') and after consonants ( 'newt'), and is thus the underlying form of the phoneme. According to Kohler, the German is further differentiated into two allophones, and : occurs after (for instance in 'book') and after (for instance in 'brook'), while either or may occur after , with predominating. In Western varieties, there is a strong tendency to realize as unrounded or , and the phoneme may be confused or merged with altogether, secondarily leading to hypercorrection effects where is replaced with , for instance in , which may be realized as .


Fortis–lenis pairs

Various German consonants occur in pairs at the same place of articulation and in the same
manner of articulation In articulatory phonetics, the manner of articulation is the configuration and interaction of the articulators ( speech organs such as the tongue, lips, and palate) when making a speech sound. One parameter of manner is ''stricture,'' that is ...
, namely the pairs , , , , . These pairs are often called fortis–lenis pairs, since describing them as voiced–voiceless pairs is inadequate. With certain qualifications, , and are also considered fortis–lenis pairs. Fortis-lenis distinction for is unimportant. The fortis stops are aspirated in many varieties. The aspiration is strongest in the onset of a stressed syllable (such as 'thaler'), weaker in the
onset Onset may refer to: * Onset (audio), the beginning of a musical note or sound * Onset, Massachusetts, village in the United States **Onset Island (Massachusetts), a small island located at the western end of the Cape Cod Canal * Interonset interva ...
of an
unstressed syllable In linguistics, and particularly phonology, stress or accent is the relative emphasis or prominence given to a certain syllable in a word or to a certain word in a phrase or sentence. That emphasis is typically caused by such properties a ...
(such as 'father'), and weakest in the
syllable coda A syllable is a unit of organization for a sequence of speech sounds typically made up of a syllable nucleus (most often a vowel) with optional initial and final margins (typically, consonants). Syllables are often considered the phonological " ...
(such as in 'seed'). All fortis consonants, i.e. are fully voiceless. The lenis consonants range from being weakly voiced to almost voiceless after voiceless consonants: ('kasbah'), ('to resign'), ('red-yellow'), ('dropping'), ('intention'), ('wooden
jalousie A jalousie window (, ) or louvered window (Australia, New Zealand, Pacific Islands, Southeast Asia, United Kingdom) is a window composed of parallel glass, acrylic, or wooden louvres set in a frame. The louvres are joined onto a track so tha ...
'), ('to chase away'), ('to drop'), ('fruit juice'). states that they are "to a large extent voiced" in all other environments, but some studies have found the stops to be voiceless word/utterance-initially in most dialects (while still contrasting with due to the aspiration of the latter). are
voiceless In linguistics, voicelessness is the property of sounds being pronounced without the larynx vibrating. Phonologically, it is a type of phonation, which contrasts with other states of the larynx, but some object that the word phonation implies ...
in most southern varieties of German. For clarity, they are often transcribed as . The nature of the phonetic difference between the voiceless lenis consonants and the similarly voiceless fortis consonants is controversial. It is generally described as a difference in articulatory force, and occasionally as a difference in articulatory length; for the most part, it is assumed that one of these characteristics implies the other. In various central and southern varieties, the opposition between fortis and lenis is neutralized in the
syllable onset A syllable is a unit of organization for a sequence of speech sounds typically made up of a syllable nucleus (most often a vowel) with optional initial and final margins (typically, consonants). Syllables are often considered the phonological ...
; sometimes just in the onset of stressed syllables, sometimes in all cases. The pair is not considered a fortis–lenis pair, but a simple voiceless–voiced pair, as remains voiced in all varieties, including the Southern varieties that devoice the lenes (with however some exceptions). Generally, the southern is realized as the voiced
approximant Approximants are speech sounds that involve the articulators approaching each other but not narrowly enough nor with enough articulatory precision to create turbulent airflow. Therefore, approximants fall between fricatives, which do produce ...
. However, there are southern varieties which differentiate between a fortis (such as in 'culpable' from
Middle High German Middle High German (MHG; german: Mittelhochdeutsch (Mhd.)) is the term for the form of German spoken in the High Middle Ages. It is conventionally dated between 1050 and 1350, developing from Old High German and into Early New High German. Hig ...
stræflich) and a lenis (, such as in 'polite' from Middle High German hovelîch); this is analogous to the opposition of fortis () and lenis .


Coda devoicing

In varieties from Northern Germany, lenis stops in the
syllable coda A syllable is a unit of organization for a sequence of speech sounds typically made up of a syllable nucleus (most often a vowel) with optional initial and final margins (typically, consonants). Syllables are often considered the phonological " ...
are realized as fortis stops. This does not happen in varieties from Southern Germany, Austria or Switzerland. Since the lenis stops are unvoiced or at most variably voiced (as stated above), this cannot be called devoicing in the strict sense of the word because it does not involve the loss of phonetic voice. More accurately, it can be called coda fortition or a neutralization of fortis and lenis sounds in the coda. Fricatives are truly and contrastively voiced in Northern Germany. Therefore, the fricatives undergo coda devoicing in the strict sense of the word. It is disputed whether coda devoicing is due to a constraint which specifically operates on syllable codas or whether it arises from constraints which "protect voicing in privileged positions." As against standard pronunciation rules, in western varieties including those of the
Rhineland The Rhineland (german: Rheinland; french: Rhénanie; nl, Rijnland; ksh, Rhingland; Latinised name: ''Rhenania'') is a loosely defined area of Western Germany along the Rhine, chiefly its middle section. Term Historically, the Rhinelands ...
, coda fortis–lenis neutralization results in ''voicing'' rather than ''devoicing'' if the following word begins with a vowel. For example, becomes and becomes . The same
sandhi Sandhi ( sa, सन्धि ' , "joining") is a cover term for a wide variety of sound changes that occur at morpheme or word boundaries. Examples include fusion of sounds across word boundaries and the alteration of one sound depending on near ...
phenomenon exists also as a general rule in the
Luxembourgish Luxembourgish ( ; also ''Luxemburgish'', ''Luxembourgian'', ''Letzebu(e)rgesch''; Luxembourgish: ) is a West Germanic language that is spoken mainly in Luxembourg. About 400,000 people speak Luxembourgish worldwide. As a standard form of th ...
language.


Stress

In German words there is always one syllable carrying main stress, with all other syllables either carrying secondary stresses or being unstressed. The position of the main stress syllable has been a matter of debate. Traditionally, word stress is seen as falling onto the first stem syllable. In recent analyses, there is agreement that main stress is placed onto one of the last three (stressable) syllables. Within this ''three-syllable window'', word stress is put regularly onto the second-to-last syllable, the penultimate syllable. However, syllable quantity may modify this pattern: a heavy final or prefinal syllable, i.e., one with a long vowel or with one or more consonants in the syllable coda, will usually attract main stress. Examples: * final stress: ''Eleˈfant'', ''Krokoˈdil'', ''Kaˈmel'' * penultimate stress: ''ˈTurban, ˈKonsul, ˈBison'' * antepenultimate stress: ''ˈPinguin'', '' ˈRisiko'', ''ˈMonitor'' A set of illustrative examples also stems from Japanese loan words, as these cannot be borrowed with their stress patterns ( Japanese has a system of pitch accents, completely different from word stress in Germanic languages): *final stress: ''Shoˈgun'', ''Samuˈrai'' * penultimate stress: ''Mitsuˈbishi'', ''Ikeˈbana'' * antepenultimate stress: ''Hiˈroshima'', '' ˈOsaka'' A list of Japanese words in German reveals that none of the words with four syllables has initial stress, confirming the ''three-syllable-window'' analysis. Secondary stresses precede main stresses if at least two syllables are present, as in ''̩Bib-li- ̩o-the-'ka-rin''. Suffixes, if containing a stressable vowel, are either stressed ''(-ei, ion, -al'', etc.) or unstressed (''-ung, -heit, -isch'', etc.) In addition, German uses different stresses for separable
prefix A prefix is an affix which is placed before the stem of a word. Adding it to the beginning of one word changes it into another word. For example, when the prefix ''un-'' is added to the word ''happy'', it creates the word ''unhappy''. Particul ...
es and inseparable prefixes in verbs and words derived from such verbs: * Words beginning with , , , , , , and a few other inseparable prefixes are stressed on the root. * Words beginning with the separable prefixes , , , , and most
prepositional adverb A prepositional adverb is a word – mainly a particle – which is very similar in its form to a preposition but functions as an adverb. Prepositional adverbs occur, for example, in English, German and Dutch. Unlike real prepositions, they occur m ...
s are stressed on the prefix. * Some prefixes, notably , , , and , can function as separable or inseparable prefixes and are stressed or not accordingly. * A few homographs with such prefixes exist. They are not perfect homophones. Consider the word . As (separable prefix), it means 'to rewrite' and is pronounced , with stress on the first syllable. Its associated noun, is also stressed on the first syllable - . On the other hand, (inseparable prefix) is pronounced , with stress on the second syllable. This word means 'to paraphrase', and its associated noun, is also stressed on the second syllable - . Another example is the word ; with stress on the root () it means 'to drive around (an obstacle in the street)', and with stress on the prefix () it means 'to run down/over' or 'to knock down'.


Acquisition


General

Like all infants, German infants go through a babbling stage in the early phases of phonological acquisition, during which they produce the sounds they will later use in their first words.
Phoneme In phonology and linguistics, a phoneme () is a unit of sound that can distinguish one word from another in a particular language. For example, in most dialects of English, with the notable exception of the West Midlands and the north-wes ...
inventories begin with stops, nasals, and
vowel A vowel is a syllabic speech sound pronounced without any stricture in the vocal tract. Vowels are one of the two principal classes of speech sounds, the other being the consonant. Vowels vary in quality, in loudness and also in quantity (len ...
s; (contrasting) short vowels and liquids appear next, followed by fricatives and
affricates An affricate is a consonant that begins as a stop and releases as a fricative, generally with the same place of articulation (most often coronal). It is often difficult to decide if a stop and fricative form a single phoneme or a consonant pa ...
, and finally all other consonants and
consonant cluster In linguistics, a consonant cluster, consonant sequence or consonant compound, is a group of consonants which have no intervening vowel. In English, for example, the groups and are consonant clusters in the word ''splits''. In the education fie ...
s. Children begin to produce protowords near the end of their first year. These words do not approximate adult forms, yet have a specific and consistent meaning. Early word productions are phonetically simple and usually follow the
syllable A syllable is a unit of organization for a sequence of speech sounds typically made up of a syllable nucleus (most often a vowel) with optional initial and final margins (typically, consonants). Syllables are often considered the phonological ...
structure CV or CVC, although this generalization has been challenged. The first vowels produced are , , and , followed by , , and , with rounded vowels emerging last. German children often use phonological processes to simplify their early word production. For example, they may delete an unstressed syllable ( 'chocolate' pronounced ), or replace a fricative with a corresponding stop ( 'roof' pronounced ). One case study found that a 17-month-old child acquiring German replaced the
voiceless velar fricative The voiceless velar fricative is a type of consonantal sound used in some spoken languages. It was part of the consonant inventory of Old English and can still be found in some dialects of English, most notably in Scottish English, e.g. in ''loc ...
with the nearest available
continuant In phonetics, a continuant is a speech sound produced without a complete closure in the oral cavity, namely fricatives, approximants, vowels, and trills. While vowels are included in continuants, the term is often reserved for consonant sound ...
, or deleted it altogether ( 'book' pronounced or ). Prosodically, children prefer bisyllabic words with the pattern strong – weak over monosyllabic words.


Vowel space development

In 2009, Lintfert examined the development of vowel space of German speakers in their first three years of life. During the babbling stage, vowel distribution has no clear pattern. However, stressed and unstressed vowels already show different distributions in the vowel space. Once word production begins, stressed vowels expand in the vowel space, while the F1F2 vowel space of unstressed vowels becomes more centralized. The majority of infants are then capable of stable production of F1. The variability of formant frequencies among individuals decreases with age. After 24 months, infants expand their vowel space individually at different rates. However, if the parents' utterances possess a well-defined vowel space, their children produce clearly distinguished vowel classes earlier. By about three years old, children command the production of all vowels, and they attempt to produce the four cardinal vowels, , , and , at the extreme limits of the F1-F2 vowel space (i.e., the height and backness of the vowels are made extreme by the infants).


Grammatical words

Generally, closed-class grammatical words (e.g. articles and prepositions) are absent from children's speech when they first begin to combine words. However, children as young as 18 months old show knowledge of these closed-class words when they prefer stories with them, compared to passages with them omitted. Therefore, the absence of these grammatical words cannot be due to perceptual problems. Researchers tested children's comprehension of four grammatical words: ] ('up to'), ('from'), ('the' neuter singular), and ('his'). After first being familiarized with the words, eight-month-old children looked longer in the direction of a speaker playing a text passage that contained these previously heard words. However, this ability is absent in six-month-olds.


Nasals

The acquisition of nasals in German differs from that of Dutch, a phonologically closely related language. German children produce proportionately more nasals in Syllable onsets, onset position (sounds before a vowel in a syllable) than Dutch children do. German children, once they reached 16 months, also produced significantly more nasals in syllables containing
schwa In linguistics, specifically phonetics and phonology, schwa (, rarely or ; sometimes spelled shwa) is a vowel sound denoted by the IPA symbol , placed in the central position of the vowel chart. In English and some other languages, it rep ...
s, when compared with Dutch-speaking children. This may reflect differences in the languages the children are being exposed to, although the researchers claim that the development of nasals likely cannot be seen apart from the more general phonological system the child is developing.


Phonotactic constraints and reading

A 2006 study examined the acquisition of German in phonologically delayed children (specifically, issues with fronting of velars and stopping of fricatives) and whether they applied phonotactic constraints to word-initial
consonant cluster In linguistics, a consonant cluster, consonant sequence or consonant compound, is a group of consonants which have no intervening vowel. In English, for example, the groups and are consonant clusters in the word ''splits''. In the education fie ...
s containing these modified consonants. In many cases, the subjects (mean age = 5.1) avoided making phonotactic violations, opting instead for other consonants or clusters in their speech. This suggests that phonotactic constraints do apply to the speech of German children with phonological delay, at least in the case of word-initial consonant clusters. Additional research has also shown that spelling consistencies seen in German raise children's phonemic awareness as they acquire reading skills.


Sound changes


Sound changes and mergers

A
merger Mergers and acquisitions (M&A) are business transactions in which the ownership of companies, other business organizations, or their operating units are transferred to or consolidated with another company or business organization. As an aspec ...
found mostly in Northern accents of German is that of (spelled ) with (spelled , , or ). Some speakers merge the two everywhere, some distinguish them everywhere, others keep distinct only in
conditional Conditional (if then) may refer to: *Causal conditional, if X then Y, where X is a cause of Y *Conditional probability, the probability of an event A given that another event B has occurred *Conditional proof, in logic: a proof that asserts a co ...
forms of
strong Strong may refer to: Education * The Strong, an educational institution in Rochester, New York, United States * Strong Hall (Lawrence, Kansas), an administrative hall of the University of Kansas * Strong School, New Haven, Connecticut, United S ...
verb A verb () is a word ( part of speech) that in syntax generally conveys an action (''bring'', ''read'', ''walk'', ''run'', ''learn''), an occurrence (''happen'', ''become''), or a state of being (''be'', ''exist'', ''stand''). In the usual descr ...
s (for example 'I would give' vs. 'I give' are distinguished, but 'bears' vs. 'berries' are not. The standard pronunciation of is ). Another common
merger Mergers and acquisitions (M&A) are business transactions in which the ownership of companies, other business organizations, or their operating units are transferred to or consolidated with another company or business organization. As an aspec ...
is that of at the end of a syllable with or , for instance ('war'), but ('wars'); ('he lay'), but ('we lay'). This pronunciation is frequent all over central and northern Germany. It is characteristic of regional languages and dialects, particularly
Low German : : : : : (70,000) (30,000) (8,000) , familycolor = Indo-European , fam2 = Germanic , fam3 = West Germanic , fam4 = North Sea Germanic , ancestor = Old Saxon , ancestor2 = Middle ...
in the North, where represents a
fricative A fricative is a consonant produced by forcing air through a narrow channel made by placing two articulators close together. These may be the lower lip against the upper teeth, in the case of ; the back of the tongue against the soft palate in ...
, becoming
voiceless In linguistics, voicelessness is the property of sounds being pronounced without the larynx vibrating. Phonologically, it is a type of phonation, which contrasts with other states of the larynx, but some object that the word phonation implies ...
in the
syllable coda A syllable is a unit of organization for a sequence of speech sounds typically made up of a syllable nucleus (most often a vowel) with optional initial and final margins (typically, consonants). Syllables are often considered the phonological " ...
, as is common in German ( final-obstruent devoicing). However common it is, this pronunciation is considered sub-standard. Only in one case, in the grammatical ending (which corresponds to English ''-y''), the fricative pronunciation of final is prescribed by the Siebs standard, for instance ('important'), 'importance'. The merger occurs neither in
Austro-Bavarian Bavarian (german: Bairisch , Bavarian: ''Boarisch'') or alternately Austro-Bavarian, is a West Germanic language, part of the Upper German family, together with Alemannic and East Franconian. Bavarian is spoken by approximately 12 million peo ...
and
Alemannic German Alemannic, or rarely Alemannish (''Alemannisch'', ), is a group of High German dialects. The name derives from the ancient Germanic tribal confederation known as the Alamanni ("all men"). Distribution Alemannic dialects are spoken by approxi ...
nor in the corresponding varieties of
Standard German Standard High German (SHG), less precisely Standard German or High German (not to be confused with High German dialects, more precisely Upper German dialects) (german: Standardhochdeutsch, , or, in Switzerland, ), is the standardized variety ...
, and therefore in these regions is pronounced . Many speakers do not distinguish the
affricate An affricate is a consonant that begins as a stop and releases as a fricative, generally with the same place of articulation (most often coronal). It is often difficult to decide if a stop and fricative form a single phoneme or a consonant pai ...
from the simple
fricative A fricative is a consonant produced by forcing air through a narrow channel made by placing two articulators close together. These may be the lower lip against the upper teeth, in the case of ; the back of the tongue against the soft palate in ...
in the beginning of a word, in which case the verb (' etravels') and the noun ('horse') are both pronounced . This most commonly occurs in northern and western Germany, where the local dialects did not originally have the sound . Some speakers also have peculiar pronunciation for in the middle or end of a word, replacing the in with a voiceless bilabial fricative, i.e. a consonant produced by pressing air flow through the tensed lips. Thereby ('drop') becomes , rather than . Many speakers who have a vocalization of after merge this combination with long (i.e. > or > or ). Hereby, ('sheep') and ('sharp') can both be pronounced or . This merger does not occur where is a front vowel while is realised as a back vowel. Here the words are kept distinct as ('sheep') and ('sharp'). In umlaut forms, the difference usually reoccurs: or vs. . Speakers with this merger also often use (instead of formally normal ) where it stems from original . The word ('arks') is thus pronounced , which makes a minimal pair with , arguably making the difference between and
phonem In phonology and linguistics, a phoneme () is a unit of sound that can distinguish one word from another in a particular language. For example, in most dialects of English, with the notable exception of the West Midlands and the north-west ...
ic, rather than just
allophonic In phonology, an allophone (; from the Greek , , 'other' and , , 'voice, sound') is a set of multiple possible spoken soundsor ''phones''or signs used to pronounce a single phoneme in a particular language. For example, in English, (as in ' ...
, for these speakers. In the standard pronunciation, the vowel qualities , , , , as well as , , , , are all still distinguished even in unstressed syllables. In this latter case, however, many simplify the system in various degrees. For some speakers, this may go so far as to merge all four into one, hence misspellings by schoolchildren such as (instead of ) or (instead of ''Portugal''). In everyday speech, more mergers occur, some of which are universal and some of which are typical for certain regions or dialect backgrounds. Overall, there is a strong tendency of reduction and contraction. For example, long vowels may be shortened, consonant clusters may be simplified, word-final may be dropped in some cases, and the suffix may be contracted with preceding consonants, e.g. for ('to have'). If the clusters , , , or are followed by another consonant, the stops , and usually lose their phonemic status. Thus while the standard pronunciation distinguishes ('whole') from ('goose'), as well as from , the two pairs are homophones for most speakers. The commonest practice is to drop the stop (thus , for both words), but some speakers insert the stop where it is not etymological (, for both words), or they alternate between the two ways. Only a few speakers retain a phonemic distinction.


Middle High German

The
Middle High German Middle High German (MHG; german: Mittelhochdeutsch (Mhd.)) is the term for the form of German spoken in the High Middle Ages. It is conventionally dated between 1050 and 1350, developing from Old High German and into Early New High German. Hig ...
vowels and developed into the modern
Standard German Standard High German (SHG), less precisely Standard German or High German (not to be confused with High German dialects, more precisely Upper German dialects) (german: Standardhochdeutsch, , or, in Switzerland, ), is the standardized variety ...
diphthong , whereas and developed into . For example, Middle High German and ('hot' and 'white') became Standard German and . In some dialects, the Middle High German vowels have not changed, e.g. Swiss German and , while in other dialects or languages, the vowels have changed but the distinction is kept, e.g. Bavarian and , Ripuarian and (however the Colognian dialect has kept the original idiphthong in ),
Yiddish Yiddish (, or , ''yidish'' or ''idish'', , ; , ''Yidish-Taytsh'', ) is a West Germanic language historically spoken by Ashkenazi Jews. It originated during the 9th century in Central Europe, providing the nascent Ashkenazi community with a ve ...
' and ' . The Middle High German
diphthong A diphthong ( ; , ), also known as a gliding vowel, is a combination of two adjacent vowel sounds within the same syllable. Technically, a diphthong is a vowel with two different targets: that is, the tongue (and/or other parts of the speech ...
s , and became the modern
Standard German Standard High German (SHG), less precisely Standard German or High German (not to be confused with High German dialects, more precisely Upper German dialects) (german: Standardhochdeutsch, , or, in Switzerland, ), is the standardized variety ...
long vowels , and after the Middle High German long vowels changed to diphthongs. Most Upper German dialects retain the diphthongs. A remnant of their former diphthong character is shown when continues to be written in German (as in 'love').


Loanwords

German incorporates a significant number of
loanword A loanword (also loan word or loan-word) is a word at least partly assimilated from one language (the donor language) into another language. This is in contrast to cognates, which are words in two or more languages that are similar because ...
s from other languages. Loanwords are often adapted to German phonology but to varying degrees, depending on the speaker and the commonness of the word. and do not occur in native German words but are common in a number of French and English loan words. Many speakers replace them with and respectively (especially in Southern Germany, Austria and Switzerland), so that (from English ''jungle'') can be pronounced or . Some speakers in Northern and Western Germany merge with , so that (phonemically ) can be pronounced , or . The realization of as , however, is uncommon.


Loanwords from English

Many English words are used in German, especially in technology and pop culture. Some speakers pronounce them similarly to their native pronunciation, but many speakers change non-native phonemes to similar German phonemes (even if they pronounce them in a rather English manner in an English-language setting): * English are usually pronounced as in RP or General American; some speakers replace them with and respectively ( th-alveolarization) e.g. . * English can be pronounced the same as in English, i.e. , or as the corresponding native German e.g. or . German and Austrian speakers tend to be variably rhotic when using English loanwords. * English is often replaced with German e.g. . * word-initial is often retained (especially in the South, where word-initial is common), but many speakers replace it with e.g. . * word-initial and are usually retained, but some speakers (especially in South Western Germany and Western Austria) replace them with and e.g. or , or . * English is usually retained, but in Northern and Western Germany, as well as Luxembourg it is often replaced with e.g. . * In Northern Standard German, final-obstruent devoicing is applied to English loan words just as to other words e.g. , or , . However, in Southern Standard German, in Swiss Standard German and Austrian Standard German, final-obstruent devoicing does not occur and so speakers are more likely to retain the original pronunciation of word-final lenes (although realizing them as fortes may occur because of confusing English spelling with pronunciation). * English and are often replaced with and respectively e.g. . * English and are pronounced the same, as German ( met–mat merger) e.g. . * English and are pronounced the same, as German ( cot–caught merger) e.g. . * English is usually pronounced as German e.g. . * English is usually pronounced as German e.g. or . * English is pronounced as (
happy-tensing The close and mid-height front vowels of English (vowels of ''i'' and ''e'' type) have undergone a variety of changes over time and often vary by dialect. Developments involving long vowels Until Great Vowel Shift Middle English had a long ...
) e.g. .


Loanwords from French

French loanwords, once very numerous, have in part been replaced by native German coinages or more recently English loanwords. Besides , they can also contain the characteristic
nasal vowel A nasal vowel is a vowel that is produced with a lowering of the soft palate (or velum) so that the air flow escapes through the nose and the mouth simultaneously, as in the French vowel or Amoy []. By contrast, oral vowels are produced with ...
s , , and (always long). However, their status as phonemes is questionable and they are often resolved into sequences either of (short) oral vowel and (in the north), or of (long or short) oral vowel and or sometimes (in the south). For example, ('balloon') may be realized as or , ('perfume') as or and ('orange') as or .


Sample

The sample text is a reading of the first sentence of " The North Wind and the Sun". The phonemic transcription treats every instance of and as and , respectively. The phonetic transcription is a fairly narrow transcription of the educated northern accent. The speaker transcribed in the narrow transcription is 62 years old, and he is reading in a colloquial style. Aspiration, glottal stops and devoicing of the lenes after fortes are not transcribed. The audio file contains the whole fable, and it was recorded by a much younger speaker.


Phonemic transcription


Phonetic transcription


Orthographic version


See also

* German orthography


Notes


References

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *


Further reading

* * * * *


External links


Listen to the pronunciation of German first names
{{DEFAULTSORT:German Phonology