German letters and words sound different than English ones. Watch this video to learn some rules to help make your German pronunciation perfekt!
Makeda has gone to visit her cousin Frank in Berlin – only to discover that Frank is no longer called Frank, and that in German words might not sound as they are written!
Rapper: Hey!
Makeda: Hey, Frank!
Rapper: Nicht Frank, bitte, or I'll never make it big! Ich heiße Rapper, it's my stage name.
Makeda: Rapper?! Haha, that's not a name!
Rapper: Is now.
Makeda: Is not. Nein!
Rapper: Is too! Ahhhh, anyway! Ready to take in the sounds of the city?
Makeda: Wait! Wait, wait, wait! Es… ist scone… ditch weedersoose-hern.
Rapper: Es ist scone… ditch weedersoose…? Ach so! Es ist schön dich wiederzusehen!
Makeda: Yeah!
Rapper: It's nice to see you again! Nice to see you too Makeda! So great that you're already speaking German. Es ist schön dich wiederzusehen. Some letters sound different to English in German, which is why I didn't understand you the first time.
Makeda: Oh, so more like, es ist shun… ditch veederzuseyhen.
Rapper: Ja. Ja. Kind of. You know ‘es ist schöööön dich wiederzusehen’. It's ‘ööö’. Like like like, ‘ööö’.
Makeda: Schööön.
Rapper: Yeah. And you know it's not ‘ditch’, like you're going to fall into it. It's ‘dich’, like an angry kitten.
Makeda: Dichhh!
Rapper: Ja, super. But a little softer, like a soft little kitten hiss. ‘Dich’.
Makeda: ‘Dich’. Okay, got it!
Rapper: And you know, for ‘wiederzusehen’, it's not ‘wheeee’, like you're on a slide. It's 'vee', you've got to give it some vroom! 'W' is always pronounced 'v'. 'IE' is always pronounced 'e'. With 'IE' and 'EI', you always pronounce the second letter. Anyway… lass uns in die Stadt gehen! Let's head into town!
Makeda: But, ‘Wie korfe ich enne Fahrkart?’ How do I buy a ticket?
Rapper: Ach, Makedalein. I'm going to have you speaking ‘perfektes Deutsch’ in no time. Komm, ich gebe dir ein paar Tipps. We put the 'i' in Polizei, and the 'e' in Batterie, when you go to the Zoo 'Tss!', you'll maybe see some ‘fff-Vieh’.
Makeda: So 'EI' is 'i', and 'IE' is 'e'. And if I find a 'Z', then it's 'Tss' like 'Tsunami'. And if I have a 'V', then that's a 'fff' like 'Vieh'. Okay, I think I can handle that!
Rapper: Oh Makeda, there's more to it than that. There's the 'ö', 'ü', 'ä' and the 'eu', 'er', 'o'.
Makeda: Eh?
Rapper: Äh! Exactly, genau! It's the ‘Äpfel’ on the table, and the 'Ü' of ‘übercool’. It's the 'er' that's like your hair, ‘Herr’, and the 'eu' that's 'oy' like ‘Eule’, ‘Oi’! Double 'S', it's not a 'B'.
Makeda: Straße!
Rapper: It's not a double 'u', it's a 'vee'. It's the 'o' of your Po.
Makeda: O!
Rapper: And words that end in 'D's are 'T'.
Makeda: Deutschland! So is that it? So it's an 'i' in Polizei And an 'e' in Batterie. If we go to the Zoo…
Rapper: 'Tsooh!'
Makeda: Doh! We'll maybe see some ‘fff-Vieh’. Those were the ‘Äpfel’ on the table, We're the 'Ü' of ‘übercool’. It's the 'er' above his hair, that ‘Herr’!
Rapper: And the 'O' that's in my Po. So that double 'S' is not a 'B'
Makeda: Straße!
Rapper: And at the end a 'D's a 'T'…
Makeda: Like ‘band’?
Rapper: Ja, now you've got it! All that's left is that a 'B's a 'P', but only when it's at the end of a word. So like… Sieb!
Makeda: So at the end a 'B''s a 'P', all right!
Rapper: Uuh… How do you have so much Energie?!
Makeda: Well, I get there's EI in Polizei, I got there's IE in Batterie, I've got the ‘ö’ in ‘Schön’ and the ‘ch’ in ‘Ich’. I can say you are a ‘Herr’ and I know it's ‘fff’ in ‘Vieh’. ‘Z’ is like the ‘Tss’ from ‘Tsunami’. I can buy some ‘Äpfel’ if I want to, let's just not talk about your ‘Po’. We live on a ‘Straße’ and we're in Deutschland and I always know we're ‘übercool’. Sorted, really.
Revise for your exams with BBC Bitesize
Get ready for the GCSEs with quizzes, past papers, flashcards, podcasts and more resources!
More on Everyday language
Find out more by working through a topic
- count2 of 10
- count3 of 10
- count4 of 10
- count5 of 10
