69
votes
Accepted
What is the linguistic necessity for the letter 'ß' in German that can't be expressed with 'ss'?
You can't call it a need, since Switzerland dropped ß at the beginning of the 20th century and has, apparently, not yet collapsed.
But ß does have a function. In intervocalic position, there is a ...
- 24.5k
25
votes
Accepted
Are “Rad” and “Rat” seriously pronounced in the same way?
In Standard German, a phenomenon called terminal devoicing (Auslautverhärtung in German) affects the pronunciation of word-final (or more generally: morpheme-final) consonants. It leads to the merging ...
- 38.3k
21
votes
What is the linguistic necessity for the letter 'ß' in German that can't be expressed with 'ss'?
Your reference to ſz is somewhat misleading, since this is more a typographical aspect, how ß is represented, in the age of Unicode surely not a problem.
From purely practical point of view, ß is a ...
- 26.7k
13
votes
Accepted
Why are some words spelled with “tz” if “z” already has the “ts” sound?
Tz indicates that the preceding vowel is short; z doesn’t (though this may still be the case for other reasons). Most other consonants are doubled in such a situation; z is different for historical ...
- 21.7k
7
votes
Accepted
What are the pronunciation rules for the consonant d?
You can't talk about the pronunciation of »d« without talking about »t« too.
Rule of thumb:
In German the letter »d« is pronounced as [d] (voiced alveolar stop)
like in these English words:
down [...
- 118k
6
votes
Are “Rad” and “Rat” seriously pronounced in the same way?
They both end with the same /t/ sound, that's true. However, to my perception, Rat tends to be pronounced with a significantly longer a than Rad. So basically
Rad /ʁat/
Rat /ʁa:t/
This is at least ...
- 1,448
5
votes
What is "Stotterlaut" in the phonetics?
Stotterlaut itself is the sound you make when you stutter (literally stutter noise). This article mentions
Nun ist d nicht nur Verschluß-, Dental-Laut, sondern wie die Erfahrung ergibt, bei häufiger ...
- 17.8k
5
votes
Accepted
orthography: voiced sonorant after short vowel, "dusselig"
Lenis consonants normally preceded by long vowels
High German has a strong tendency that lenis consonants are preceded long vowels (or diphthongs, which count as long vowels in this regard). This is ...
- 6,849
4
votes
What are the pronunciation rules for the consonant d?
There is no standard dialect as you assume. German pronounciation heavily depends on the region you are in, and on the speaker — because people are taking their home dialect to the place where they ...
- 51.8k
4
votes
Accepted
Softer vs. harder sounding consonants
Those two sounds – word-initial and medial single s and the ending -ig – are probably the most volatile sounds in German pronunciation along with ch after light vowels. They both can be used as ...
- 38.3k
3
votes
Softer vs. harder sounding consonants
It's complicated.
There is not just one German language. There are three standard variations of German. (The links will bring you to the corresponding wikipedia articles in English and German):
...
- 118k
3
votes
Accepted
Spricht man das 'r' in "Verlust"?
Im Studium haben wir es so gelernt, dass man ein vokalisches R [ɐ] in der unbetonten Silbe -er- und damit auch Vorsilben wie ver-,her-, etc. spricht. Dieses deckt sich mit diversen Linguistik Seiten:
...
- 211
2
votes
What are the pronunciation rules for the consonant d?
German /d/ is normally voiceless. Voice is an optional feature that commonly occurs in Northern German if the /d/ is inbetween other voiced sounds (vowels, for instance). In Southern German, the ...
- 6,849
2
votes
Does Pre-Glottalisation Occur with Voiceless Stops at Syllable Coda?
There are two big problems with the global stop [ʔ]:
Most speakers are not aware of speaking it, and they are not aware of hearing it.
There is no letter (or combination of letters) that marks a ...
- 118k
2
votes
Is there a difference in pronunciation between "ist" and "isst"?
Actually no, but lots of Germans pronounce "ist" without the "t" at the end.Generally there is absolutely no difference. You can guess the meaning from the context like
Er ist/isst ein Kind.
...
- 21
2
votes
Accepted
List of words that demonstrate all German consonant and vowel sounds
The following list of phonemes is based on: Klaus J. Kohler, Einführung in die Phonetik des Deutschen, 2nd revised edition, Berlin: Erich Schmidt, 1995; chapters 6.1.1 and 6.1.2.
The example words are ...
- 24.5k
1
vote
List of words that demonstrate all German consonant and vowel sounds
If you're learning German then the link you gave should be enough to be getting on with. But it will be more useful to actually listen rather than to read descriptions, so you might be interested in ...
- 9,515
1
vote
Softer vs. harder sounding consonants
The proper ("official") way to pronounce German words is normally found in dictionaries like "Der Duden".
But there are regional differences for some sounds (when dialect speakers &...
- 49
1
vote
Gibt es Erbwörter mit „pf“ oder „ff“?
Ich glaube, dass die modernen deutschen Wörter, die auf -umpf enden, Erbwörter sind:
stumpf (Adjektiv)
der Stumpf (Substantiv)
der Strumpf (Substantiv)
der Rumpf (Substantiv)
Beispiel der Stumpf:
...
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