Swedish Phonology

1. Segmentals

Vowels

The Swedish alphabet comprises nine vowels: a, e, i, o, u, y, å, ä and ö

Regarding the pronunciation, the language consists of 18 vowel phonemes which are distinguished by their length. There are nine long and nine short vowels which entail a difference of quality and quantity and are therefore meaning distinguishing. Diphthongs do not exist in Swedish.

Long Vowels

There are nine long vowel phonemes in the Swedish language.

	Front unrounded	Front rounded	Central rounded	Back rounded
Close	iː	yː	ʉː	uː
Close mid	eː	øː		oː
Open mid	ɛː
Open				ɑː

Examples: is [iːs] ny [nyː] mus [mʉːs] sol [suːl] led [leːd] öl [øːl] bås [boːs] näs [nɛːs] sak [sɑːk]

Short Vowels

Swedish makes use of nine short vowels.

	Front unrounded	Front rounded	Central rounded	Back rounded
Close	ɪ	ʏ		ʊ
Close mid	e		ɵ
Open mid	ɛ	œ		ɔ
Open	a

In many cases e and ä coincide and are pronounced the same such as in sett - sätt. This sometimes leads to the assumption that there are only eight short vowels.

Minimal Pairs

Minimal pairs help to prove that two words differ in meaning based on one single sound which varies.

Letter	Long vowel	Short vowel
i	vit	vitt
e	vet	vett
ä	rät	rätt
a	fal	fall
y	byt	bytt
ö	röt	rött
o	bot	bott
å	fåt	fått
u	Rut	rutt

Hence, vit ('white': utrum, singular) and vitt ('white': neutrum, singular), for instance, are both spelled with an i. Though through the doubling of the final consonant the quality of the vowel changes from [iː] (as in vit) to [ɪ] (as in vitt). This verifies that length is meaning distinguishing in Swedish. Quite often the doubling of a consonant is responsible for the shortened pronunciation of a vowel.

Consonants

Typical for Standard Swedish is for instance the /ɧ/ phoneme which renders the consonant cluster sj as in sjö. It is described as a sound between [x] and [ʃ] but this argument is often disputed. In some dialects, especially in northern and Finland Swedish, /ɧ/ does not exist.

Furthermore the retroflex consonants [ʈ, ɖ, ʂ, ɭ] and [ɳ] are a fixture in Standard Swedish. They are orthographically represented by the consonant clusters rt, rd, rs, rl and rn. Opinions differ concerning the total number of consonant phonemes since retroflex consonants are often treated as allophones. In Finland Swedish, for instance, retroflex consonants do not exist. They are realised bisegmentally as [rːs, rːd, rːs, rːl] and [rːn].

Standard Swedish: [fɔʂː]
Finland Swedish:  [fɔrːs]

Since this article deals with Standard Swedish, which is the dominating regional variety, retroflex consonants are counted among phonemes. Hence there are 23 consonant phonemes in the Standard Swedish language altogether.

	Labial	Alveolar	Retroflex	Palatal	Velar	Glottal
Plosive	p, b	t, d	ʈ, ɖ		k, g
Fricative	f, v	s	ʂ	ɕ	ɧ	h
Nasal	m	n	ɳ		ŋ
Trill / Flap		r
Approximant				j
Lateral Approximant		l	ɭ

Annotation: Where two phonemes appear in a single column the first phoneme is always voiceless and the second one voiced.

Phonological Rules

Retroflex Consonants

Not only are retroflex consonants fixed in lexemes but they can also occur in different articulatory patterns:

1. They can cross over word boundaries if the final letter of a word is a r and the initial letter of the following word is either t, d, s, l or n,

e.g. vår triumf /voːrtriɵmf/ [voːʈriɵmf], hur mår du /hʉːrmoːrdɵ/ [hʉːrmoːɖɵ], under sängen /ɵndərsɛŋən/ [ɵndəʂɛŋən], eller nej /ɛlərnɛj/ [ɛləɳɛj], hur ledsam /hʉːrlesam/ [hʉːɭesam].

2. When the genitive s is attached to a word ending with r, the retroflex ʂ is used,

e.g. Peters hus [petəʂhʉːs], min mors affär [minmuːʂafæːr].

2. Supra-Segmentals

Tone Accents

Swedish is a pitch accent language which once derived from Old Norse. It has two distinctive prosodical patterns related to the different syllabic structures in Old Norse. These two patterns cause a difference in meaning: Audio sample: 'anden'

1. Accent 1 (acute) which all old monosyllabic words receive,

e.g.  'and-en      [ándɛn]
     duck-DEF   

2. Accent 2 (grave) which all old dissyllabic words receive,

e.g.  ,an'de-n      [àndɛn]
     ghost-DEF

Besides its historical background, there are some further phonological rules:

1. Accent 1 can occur in any accented syllable regardless of position.

2. Accent 2 never occurs in the last syllable of a word. Therefore only polysyllabic words can have an accent contrast.

Assimilation

Due to proximity, one sound influences the articulation of another sound. Thus the pronunciation of the velar plosives /g/ and /k/ differs according to the sound environment of the subsequent vowel.

If the voiced /g/ precedes a back vowel it does not change its velar position and is pronounced as [g]. If it precedes a front vowel it is palatalised and pronounced as [j].

gå [goː]     göra ['jøːra]

The same applies to the voiceless counterpart /k/. If it precedes a back vowel its velar position is maintained and pronounced as [k]. If it precedes a front vowel it is palatalised and pronounced as [ɕ].

kort [kʊʈ]   köpa ['ɕøːra]

3. Phonotactics

In modern Swedish the phonotactic patterns V:K and VK: are possible.

tak [tɑːk], tack [takː]

Furthermore the cluster VK was introduced to Finland Swedish on account of its contact with the Finnish language.

Likewise in many Germanic languages, the consonant cluster CCC is possible in Swedish. Combinations which are operative in spelling and in speech are spr, spl, spj, str, skr and skv.

Examples:
sprida (to spread), splittra (to splint; splint), spjut (spear), strejka (to go on strike), skriva (to write), skvallra (to gossip)

Stj and skj exist in written but not in spoken form. These two clusters are pronounced with the typical Swedish [ɧ] sound.

Examples:
stjärna (star) [ɧɛːɳa], skjorta (shirt) [ɧʉːta]

References

• http://www.haskins.yale.edu/Reprints/HL0059.pdf
• Hall, Tracy Alan. Phonologie: Eine Einführung. Berlin: de Gruyter, 2000. Print.

Quod Vide

• Swedish
• Schwedisch