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| Eric: Welcome back to AfrikaansPod101.com. This is All About, Lesson 4, Afrikaans Pronunciation Made Easy. I’m Eric. |
| Pieter: Hallo, I’m Pieter. |
| Eric: In this lesson, we're going to share our take on Afrikaans pronunciation with you. |
| Pieter: Pronunciation of the Afrikaans language is often considered one of the hardest parts of learning the language, but it’s probably the most important one. |
| Eric: From experience, one of the best ways to get Afrikaans pronunciation down is to listen and repeat, and listen and repeat. |
| Pieter: Yes, just copy the sounds a native speaker makes. |
| Eric: Then, just like an annoying song, one day Afrikaans will get stuck in your head, and you'll be set for life! |
| Pieter: So make sure you repeat all the sounds I make today. That will get you on the road to speaking Afrikaans. |
| Eric: So first, learning about the Afrikaans alphabet is going to help make things clearer. Let's briefly review the characteristics of the Afrikaans alphabet. |
| Pieter: There are twenty-six letters in total in the Afrikaans alphabet. |
| Eric: Six vowels and 20 consonants. |
| Pieter: Let’s start with the vowels. They are “a, e, i, o, u, y.” |
| Eric: It is important to know the reading of the alphabet, because letters are often, though not always, pronounced the same way when they appear in words. |
| Pieter: Let’s have a look at the first three vowels, the “a,” “e,” and “i.” If we spell these vowels in Afrikaans, we would say “a, e, i” |
| Eric: That can be quite confusing. Let’s hear the English pronunciation followed by the Afrikaans one. |
| Pieter: “a” is a, “e” is e, and “i” is i. Now let’s see how we can use these in a word. The letter a in the Afrikaans word kat, or the English word “cat” is pronounced like the letter “a” in “what.” The letter e in the Afrikaans word melk, or the English word “milk” is pronounced like the letter “e” in “bell.” The letter i in the Afrikaans word sit, or the English verb “sit” is pronounced like the “a” in “about.” |
| Eric: We won't go through the whole alphabet in this lesson. But if you really want to sink your teeth into correct Afrikaans pronunciation, you can listen to our pronunciation series. For now, there are a few important points about Afrikaans pronunciation we need to tell our listeners. |
| Pieter: Yes. The first things we need to mention are Afrikaans accents. |
| Eric: Yes. I'm sure you're all wondering what that little line above some Afrikaans letters actually does! |
| Pieter: Well, as in many other languages, it indicates which syllable is stressed in a word. |
| Eric: And be careful, because depending on where the accent is, the meaning can change too! |
| Pieter: For example, sê and se are both spelled “s-e.” But the first sê has the accent and means “say”, while se without the accent is used to show possession. For example, Jan se boek means “Jan’s book.” |
| Eric: Let’s move on to the second point, the consonants. |
| Pieter: We have 20 of them and many of them sound the same as English. |
| Eric: That’s true, but some do sound different. For example, the letters d and b, when occurring at the end of a word, are in fact pronounced as /t/ and /p/ respectively. |
| Pieter: Like goed, “good” in English. The last letter, d, in the Afrikaans word, sounds like a t, goed. Another is klub, which means “club” in English. The last letter, b in the Afrikaans word, sounds like a p, klub. We can also combine consonants and they will produce different sounds. For example, the ng in the Afrikaans word piesang, which is “banana” in English. |
| Eric: Yeah, the “ng” sounds like the last sound in the English word “sing.” Actually that doesn't sound too difficult! Many of these sounds are used in English as well. |
| Pieter: Exactly. So we combined two consonants to make a new sound, and we can also combine the vowels and make new sounds. |
| Eric: So what combinations can we make here? |
| Pieter: Well, we can double the vowels. For example we use two a’s in the Afrikaans word maar, meaning “but,” or two e’s in the Afrikaans word meer, meaning “more.” |
| Eric : Sounds great! |
| Pieter: To make more combos, we can basically put any two vowels together. Like eu, oe, or ou. |
| Eric. Wow, there is a lot of creativity in this language! Okay, that’s it for this lesson. |
| Pieter: Thanks for listening! |
| Eric: And we’ll see you next time. |
| Pieter: Totsiens! |
Comments
HideWhat's the most difficult pronunciation for you?
Hello Marie,
You’ve come to the right place to learn Afrikaans, and we are glad to have you with us! 😊
Please don't hesitate to contact us if any questions arise throughout your studies. We would be happy to help!
Sincerely,
Ali
Team AfrikaansPod101.com
I failed afrikaans so i joined so far im learning
Hi Mehar,
Thank you for your feedback!
You can also check other series which have the [Dialogue] and [Vocabulary] sections with audio and voice recorder features:
https://www.afrikaanspod101.com/lesson-library/absolute-beginner
Looking forward to seeing you often here.
Sincerely,
Cristiane
Team AfrikaansPod101.com
Hi.
one more thing.
There should be pronunciation test in this lesson for learners specially.
So they can find out their mistakes in speaking.
thanks
Hi good day,
It is very really excellent way of teaching.
Pronunciation is key to success in learning and perfecting a language.
So i suggest that with Lesson notes, there should be voice note with each example like in first lesson for beginners.
And those voice notes must have slow speed and fast speed option too to understand easily.
i hope you will understand my point.
thanks
kind regards
Hey Luis
Daar is definitief 'n verskil in die uitspraak van 'se' en 'sê'.
'Se' is with an almost closed mouth with your breath leaving your mouth.
'Se" you are forcing your mouth into a wide smile and forcing your breath out.
I think this might sound funny but it changes the way you say it :-)
Let me know if you hear the difference!
Lekker dag
Zani
Team AfrikaansPod101.com
Ek kan nie onderskei tussen die uitspraak van "se" en "sê". Is daardie "ê" (e met 'n samentrekkingsteken) 'n lang of 'n kort geluid? Albei klink dieselfde vir my ore!!
Hi Jacinta,
Glad to hear that you're learning well with our pronunciation series!
Should you have any questions, please let us know.
Sincerely,
Cristiane
Team AfrikaansPod101.com
I have been having alot of challenges with pronunciation. This is a good audio. I appreciate it. Thank you for breaking it down so nicely.
Hi Shalom,
Thank you for the cute emoticons! :)
We hope you liked the lesson!
Let us know if you have any questions.
Sincerely,
Cristiane
Team AfrikaansPod101.com
😄😄😄👍
Hallo Teresa
Thank you for the comment.
Unfortunately, there are no audios available for this, but these words are in different lessons. Please look at the audio lesson library and video lesson library to help you with pronunciation.
Hope this helps!
Lekker dag
Zani
TeamAfrikaansPod101.com
Goeie Naand Zani!
Is there an audio of the lesson notes which provides the pronunciation correctly versus just reading the examples and risking learning it incorrectly? If not - can an audio be posted for this?
Baie Dankie
Teresa
Hallo Mary
Thank you for the question!
Could you please send us the examples, it will be easier to explain then.
One thing to note is when a vowel is in a open syllable it is a longer sound, compared to being between consonants.
Bene - Be - ne (the first 'e' is a long 'e' en the second sound like a 'a'.
Ken - Ken (Just like you would say in English)
All the best
Zani
TeamAfrikaansPod101.com
I'm confused. The pronunciation guide for the vowels is different than the one in the "pronounce like a native lessons"- it's still Eric and Pieter doing the lesson. For example, the other lesson says that short 'e' should be like the "ah" in cat, and short 'i' should be like the 'ut' in "put", but this guide makes it sound like the short 'e' and 'i' are pronounced the same as in English. Can someone clarify please?
Hello Luna
The 'r' is difficult!:flushed: BUT you will be able to train your tongue and your mouth to do it the more you try!
Jy kan dit doen!
You can do it!
Lekker dag!
Zani
TeamAfrikaansPod101.com
For me the most difficult pronunciation in Afrikaans is 'r'. I just simply couldn't make the sound ... 😭
Hello Chip,
Thank you for posting.
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Let us know if you have any question.
Sincerely,
Lena
Team AfrikaansPod101.com
Hello Chip
Thank you for the information, we are following up at the moment.
Please let us know if you have any other questions.
Lekker dag!
Have a good day
Zani
Team AfrikaansPod101,com
I can't access the lesson transcript for lesson 4. It keeps bringing up lesson 3. Reading along with thecaudio helps. Can you help?