{"id":563,"date":"2012-06-16T09:00:35","date_gmt":"2012-06-16T09:00:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/danish\/?p=563"},"modified":"2012-07-04T22:52:59","modified_gmt":"2012-07-04T22:52:59","slug":"3-strange-friends","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/danish\/2012\/06\/16\/3-strange-friends\/","title":{"rendered":"3 Strange Friends: D, R and G"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/danish\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/30\/2012\/06\/vokaler.png\" aria-label=\"Vokaler\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft size-full wp-image-564\"  alt=\"\" width=\"165\" height=\"178\" \/ src=\"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/danish\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/30\/2012\/06\/vokaler.png\"><\/a>As you\u2019ve hopefully learnt from the last few months\u2019 how-to-say-it sessions, one of the reasons Danish is so hard to pronounce is found in the way vowels (a, e, i, o, u, y, \u00e6, \u00f8, \u00e5) mess up their neighbours. Let\u2019s review:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>R<\/strong> after a vowel becomes a kind of British <em>or<\/em> sound, as in <strong>tur<\/strong> [too\u1d52\u02b3] \u2019trip\u2019<\/li>\n<li><strong>D<\/strong> after a vowel sounds like the <em>th<\/em> sound of English <em>mother,<\/em> said with a swollen tongue, as in <strong>glad<\/strong> [glath] \u2019happy\u2019<\/li>\n<li><strong>G<\/strong> after a dark vowel (o, u, \u00e5, ra) &#8211; and after R \u2011 sounds like the W of English <em>now<\/em>, as in <strong>brag<\/strong> [brah-w] \u2019clash\u2019<\/li>\n<li><strong>G<\/strong> after a light vowel \u2013 and after L \u2013 sounds like the Y of English <em>hey<\/em>, as in <strong>pige<\/strong> [PEEY-eh] \u2019girl\u2019<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Phew, that\u2019s quite a bit to remember, isn\u2019t it? A tip: <span style=\"color: #800000\">Keep you mouth wide open when talking, that will help you opening up for those flimsy Danish sounds!<\/span><\/p>\n<p>Just like English spelling, Danish spelling is quite conservative. That is, spellings that seemed logical in the Middle Ages, are kept like that, even if the way the words are said has changed a lot! I guess many Danish schoolchildren have been chewing their pencils, trying to figure out why <strong>dej<\/strong> (dough) and <strong>dig<\/strong> ([object] you, as in \u2019I love you\u2019) both sound like [dy].<\/p>\n<p>Here\u2019s a little rhyming thing, which can hopefully help making things clearer:<br \/>\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"3friends\" width=\"500\" height=\"281\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/fTX3GEt1Owk?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<h3><span style=\"color: #800000\">Three Strange Friends<\/span><\/h3>\n<blockquote><p>The Danish D was an adamant dude,<br \/>\nrefusing to bend, so harsh and so rude,<br \/>\nonly vowels in front could him anyhow soothe,<br \/>\nas in <strong>s\u00f8d<\/strong> and in <strong>glad<\/strong> and in <strong>side<\/strong> and <strong>ud<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: right\"><span style=\"color: #999999\"><em>(English meanings: sweet, happy, page, out)<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n<p>The Danish R was quite a bore,<br \/>\nshe gargled along with the sound of a snore,<br \/>\ntill the vowels said, Britishly, \u201dcome, join us, my De-ar,<br \/>\nas in <strong>\u00f8re<\/strong> and <strong>p\u00e6re<\/strong> and <strong>ord<\/strong> and <strong>papir<\/strong>.\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: right\"><span style=\"color: #999999\"><em>(ear, pear, word, paper [pron. pahPEER)<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n<p>The Danish G was the chameleon guy,<br \/>\ntoo good to be true, as the vowels would say,<br \/>\nin some words he\u2019d act in a W way,<br \/>\nmaking <strong>Prag<\/strong> rhyme with <strong>grav<\/strong> (and with <em>\u2019now\u2019<\/em>, BTW),<br \/>\nin other words he\u2019d sound just like a Y,<br \/>\nrhyming <strong>leg<\/strong>, <strong>dig og mig<\/strong> with <strong>dej<\/strong>, <strong>maj<\/strong> \u2013 and \u2019<em>bye<\/em>\u2019!<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: right\"><span style=\"color: #999999\"><em>(Prague, grave, play, you \u2019n\u2019 me, dough, May)<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<img width=\"165\" height=\"178\" src=\"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/danish\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/30\/2012\/06\/vokaler.png\" class=\"attachment-post-thumbnail size-post-thumbnail wp-post-image tmp-hide-img\" alt=\"\" decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" \/><p>As you\u2019ve hopefully learnt from the last few months\u2019 how-to-say-it sessions, one of the reasons Danish is so hard to pronounce is found in the way vowels (a, e, i, o, u, y, \u00e6, \u00f8, \u00e5) mess up their neighbours. Let\u2019s review: R after a vowel becomes a kind of British or sound, as in&hellip;<\/p>\n<p class=\"post-item__readmore\"><a class=\"btn btn--md\" href=\"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/danish\/2012\/06\/16\/3-strange-friends\/\">Continue Reading<\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"author":76,"featured_media":564,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"content-type":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[89909,89910],"class_list":["post-563","post","type-post","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-diphtongs","tag-written-language"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/danish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/563","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/danish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/danish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/danish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/76"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/danish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=563"}],"version-history":[{"count":14,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/danish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/563\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":598,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/danish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/563\/revisions\/598"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/danish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/564"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/danish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=563"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/danish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=563"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/danish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=563"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}