Chapter 3: German Alphabets

Unique Characteristics of the German Alphabet:

1. German has a so-called extended Latin alphabet. The extra letters are (Umlaut) ä, ö, ü and (esszet) ß.

2. The pronunciation of some of these letters do not exist in the English language.

3. Several letters are pronounced more from the back of the throat: g, ch, r (though in Austria the r is trilled).

4. Most of the time the S in German sounds like Z in English when placed at the beginning of a word followed by a vowel.

Now we will visit each alphabet separately and learn their pronunciation with example(s). Each alphabet are in the order:

Letter     Pronunciation of letter name     Sound of Letter - as pronounced in     Examples

Letter: A a     Pronounced as: ah     As pronounced in: astronaut     For example: der Apfel(apple)

The rest of the alphabets are also similarly structured.

B b     approximate: bay     baby     der Bruder (brother)

C c     approximate: stay     Celcius     Celcius

D d     approximate: day     dollar     der Dienstag (Tuesday)

E e     approximate: ay     elegant     essen (to eat)

F f     eff     effort     der Freund (friend)

G g     approximate: gay     gorgeous     gut (good)

H h     has     hammer     der Hammer

I I     eeh     Igor     der Igel (porcupine)

J j     you     yellow     das Jahr (year)

K k     kah     camel      das Kamel, der Kuchen (cake)

L l     ell     love     das Land (land)

M m     em     man     der Mann

N n     en     nice     nicht (not)

O o     oh     oven     Ostern (Easter)

P p     approximate: pay     party     die Polizei (police)

Q q     koo     coral     das Quadrat (square)

Note: All German words that start with qu (kw - sound)

R r     approximate: er     rich     der Rücken (the back)

S s     es     zoo, shine, mouse     die Maus

T t     approximate: tay    tyrant     acht (eight)

U u     ooh     ou sound in you     die Universität (university)

V v     fow     father     der Vogel (bird)

W w    approximate: vay     van     die Wange (cheek), das Schwein (pig)

X x     ix sounds like kz     das Xylophon, die Hexe (witch)

Y y     uep-si-lohn     yellow     die Yucca (a type of plant)

Z z     tset sounds like ts     die Zeitung (newspaper)

Umlaut + ß (esszet)

ä     similar to the e in melon     die Äpfel (apples)

ö     similar to the i in girl    öffnen (to open)

ü     no equivalent sound     müde (tired)

ß     double s sound      heiß (hot)

Now that we all know how we pronounce each alphabet we can try spelling our names. For e.g. My name is Ana. Mein Name ist Ana. If someone was to ask me to spell my name. "Can you spell your name?" (Könnten Sie es buchstabieren?) My answer should be "A (aa), N (en), A (aa)" or we can also answer it as "A wie Apfel, N wie nicht, A wie Apfel." It means A for Apple, N for not, A for apple.

As an exercise you can try spelling out your names or any object like an apple.

You must have noticed der, die, and das. These are definite articles like 'the' in English only in german they differ for each gender Masculine (der), Feminine (die), and Neutral (das). Every noun has its own gender.  So, whenever you come across a noun make sure to learn it with its gender. e.g. der Apfle, die Frau(woman), das Mädchen(girl).

We will come back to this topic later. For now bis später.