Appendix:Norwegian pronunciation

This is a guide to pronunciation of Norwegian. There is no centrally mandated pronunciation of Norwegian. In Wiktionary, the pronunciation given for Norwegian Bokmål generally reflects the pronunciation of Central Eastern Norway, in and around Oslo. The pronunciation given for Norwegian Nynorsk generally reflects the pronunciation in the parts of Norway where Nynorsk is mostly used. Other pronunciations may also be possible.

ConsonantsEdit

PlosivesEdit

Phoneme	Transcription, example and translation
p	par, /pɑːr/, "pair; couple"
b	bok, /buːk/, "book"
t	tam, /tam:/ invalid IPA characters (:), replace : with ː, "tame"
ʈ	vært, /ʋæʈː/, "been"
d	dam, /dam:/ invalid IPA characters (:), replace : with ː, "pond"
ɖ	burde, /'bʉɖə/ invalid IPA characters ('), replace ' with ˈ, "should; ought to"
k	katt, /katː/, "cat"
ɡ	god, /ɡuː/, "good"

/p, t, k/ are all aspirated and pronounced almost identical to the equivalent English sounds. /b, d, ɡ/ are distinctly voiced, moreso than the English equivalents of most dialects.

FricativesEdit

Phoneme	Transcription, example and translation
f	fot, /fuːt/, "foot"
ʋ	våt, /ʋoːt/, "wet"
s	sol, /suːl/, "sun"
ʂ	torsdag, /toːʂdaɡ/, Thursday
ʃ	sju, /ʃʉː/, "seven"
ç	kjapp, /çapː/, "fast"
j	jord, /juːr/, "soil"
h	han, /hɑnː/, "he"

/r/Edit

Phoneme	Transcription, example and translation
r	rød, /røː/, "red"

The pronunciation of /r/ varies in the various dialects. In eastern dialects the pronunciation is more forward, [r] or [ɾ] while the pronunciation in western dialects is further back, [ʁ] [χ].

In most dialects /s, t, d, n, l/ merge with /r/ into retroflex assimilations [ʂ, ɖ, ʈ, ɳ, ɭ].

LateralsEdit

Phoneme	Transcription, example and translation
l	"land", /lɑnː/, "country"

NasalsEdit

Phoneme	Transcription, example and translation
m	"mann", /mɑnː/, "man"
n	"nese", /ˈneːsə/, "nose"
ŋ	"lang", /lɑŋː/, "long"

VowelsEdit

**Long vowels**
Phoneme	Transcription, example and translation
iː
yː
ʉː
eː
æː
ɑː
øː
uː
oː

**Short vowels**
Phoneme	Transcription, example and translation
ɪ
ʏ
ʉ
ɛ
ɑ
œ
ʊ
ɔ
ə

**Diphthongs**
Phoneme	Transcription, example and translation
æʉ
æɪ
œʏ

Stress and tonemesEdit

Most dialects of Norwegian separate between two distinct tonemes. The way they are realised differs considerably between different dialects. The table gives only a few examples.

Stress and tone
IPA	Examples	Examples of realisation
[ˈ]	bønder [ˈbønːər] [ˈbønːəʁ]	Tone 1 / acute accent: low-rising tone in Oslo and Trondheim: [ˈbø̀nːə̌r] falling-low tone in Bergen: [ˈbø̂nːə̀ʁ] rising-falling tone in Stavanger: [ˈbø̌nːɔ̂ʁ] simple primary stress in certain accents: [ˈbønːər]^[1]
[²]	bønner [²bønːər] [²bønːəʁ]	Tone 2 / grave accent: falling-rising tone in Oslo and Trondheim: [ˈbø̂nːə̌r] rising-falling tone in Bergen: [ˈbø̌nːə̂ʁ] falling-falling tone in Stavanger: [ˈbø̂nːɔ̂ʁ] simple primary stress in certain accents: [ˈbønːər]^[1]

↑ ^1.0 ^1.1 A few dialects have a simple primary stress rather than a contrastive pitch accent. In those accents, bønder (meaning 'farmers') and bønner (meaning 'beans') are pronounced exactly the same.

[notonemes-1] 1.0 ^1.1 A few dialects have a simple primary stress rather than a contrastive pitch accent. In those accents, bønder (meaning 'farmers') and bønner (meaning 'beans') are pronounced exactly the same.

[1]