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Diphthongs, Double Vowels, and Triple Vowels Posted by on Apr 23, 2009 in Dutch Language

Just like the post just before this, I’ll give the vowel, give a close English approximation of how it’s pronounced and give two examples of Dutch words that have the vowel. The Dutch words will be highlighted in black and in parentheses. The English meaning will follow afterwards.

ie – kind of like the ee in seen. (lied) song, (vriend) friend

eu – made by forming the mouth for the oo in book and then having the tongue lowered and pulled back. (neus) nose, (keuken) kitchen

oe – like the o in English word do. (goed) good, (zoet) sweet

ei/ij – makes the same sound in English ay in say. (rijs) rice, (reist) travels

au/ou – like the ow in now. (gauw) quickly, (goud) gold

ui – round your lips and make a sound between a Dutch ou and eu. (huis) house, (vuil) dirty

aai – this is a combination of Dutch aa and ie. (draaien) to turn, (maaien) to mow

oei – combination of oe and ie. (groeien) to grow, (vermoeid) tired

ooi – combination of oo and ie. (gooien) to throw, (mooi) beautiful

eeuw – combination of ee and oe. (leeuwen) lions, (geeuwen) to yawn

iew – combination of ie and oe. (vernieuwen) to renew, (kieuwen) gills of a fish

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Comments:

  1. David:

    I have a question about pronunciation:

    I’ve heard the ‘ij’ in Dutch as a long English ‘i’ sound (like the ‘y’ in ‘why’); I’ve also heard the ‘s’ on the end of words like a regular ‘s,’ but also as an English ‘sh.’ Are these just regional variations? Thank you!

  2. Yohann:

    David,

    you’re right, “ij” sounds a lot like the “i” in “hi”. When the Dutch read the alphabet out loud, they say “ij” even if they actually write “y”. As for the s, you can hear it as an English s, but you’ll also hear it as an “sh” when there’s a “sj” combination. These sounds are not necessarily regional. You can hear them in standard Dutch as well.

  3. James_Chance:

    I think there’s one more:

    uw – combination of uu and oe. (ruw) rough, (duw) push