Estonian Alphabet and Pronunciation
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- Опубліковано 2 жов 2024
- In this video, we dive into the beautiful Estonian alphabet and its unique pronunciation system. Learn how to correctly pronounce each letter and discover some useful tips for the tricky sounds!
If you're a beginner to the Estonian language, mastering the alphabet is the first step towards unlocking the language. Impress your Estonian friends or colleagues by nailing the pronunciation of this unique and fascinating alphabet.
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Ok the lip/tongue tip is genius!
I’m glad it helped!
In Estonian b, d, g are never voiced. I would never say beebi the way you said it.
Borrowed letters: c, q, š, ž, w, x, y are correct. No Estonian words start with b, d, g, but they appear often as the first letter of the second syllable and onwards (e.g. kabi, padi, tugi = hoof, pillow, sleigh). f, š and ž only appear in borrowed words. c, q, w, x, y in foreign names. ž is pronounced as the g in English genre.
I cannot find the source for this, but I know it is in one of my books, plus this is how our Estonian teacher explained it. Estonian does not really have B D G as voiced sounds. The word 'beebi' is pronounced /pe:pi/. Note that /e:/ means a long E sound. As you know, Estonian marks short, long and overlong vowels and consonants. In the case of B D G, they are the short /p/ /t/ /k/. Then you have P T K which are the long /p:/ /t:/ /k:/. Finally, you have PP TT KK which are the overlong /p::/ /t::/ /k::/. These are the only consonants where the ortography clearly marks this ternary distinction. This is why a word like "olete" is pronounced /olet:e/ (long T sound) and not /olete/ (short T sound). Of course, P T K sounds at the beginning of a word are short. And I just found this too: ua-cam.com/video/5zJ6N9ZXsWk/v-deo.html&ab_channel=UniversityofTartuPhoneticsLab
Great insight, you’re absolutely right! I’ve found that for English speakers learning Estonian, this is a challenging concept to understand at first, so I typically haven’t emphasized it. Thanks for finding such a clear way to explain this, I’ll definitely be referencing it in the future.
As a Finn, I can only laugh at the stupidity of that o and ö hybrid, I can't tell what makes it even a letter as for me it sounds exactly like a vague ö...
Thank you so much for this comprehensive explanation of the vowels! Very helpful!
thankyou so much,this is really helpful
thank you so sooo muchhh! i’m learning Estonian so i can communicate better with my boyfriend’s grandfather, wish me luck lol !
That’s awesome! I’m glad this helped. Let me know if you have any questions!
But how would you pronounce C? Is it a ts sound? Is it a s sound? Or is it a k sound?
C is a foreign letter and appears in words borrowed from other languages. Because of this, the pronunciation of C usually mimics the language the word originated from.
@@estonianunlocked To add to this: when an Estonian has no idea of the original pronunciation of the name C can be pronounced in all three ways. In some "adopted" words this creates unexpected distortions. E.g. reading comments on the Internet 'case' as in 'court case' is occasionally spelled as 'geiss' though the transliteration would be 'keiss' (hearing a word of clearly foreign origin they haven't seen written they assume it must be spelled differently from hearing).
So super helpful on the last two. Have struggled for a couple years. Very useful
Glad I could help!
I love this!
Thanks for your feedback! Stay tuned for more tutorials!