Finnish language phonetics
This article deals with the sound patterns of the Finnish language. The grammar of Finnish and the way(s) in which Finnish is spoken are dealt with in separate articles.
Originally, Finnish had no initial consonant clusters, this however is changing due to influence from other European languages.
Older borrowings from (e.g.) Swedish have had initial consonant clusters eroded. For example "koulu" <- school, "tuoli" <- stool.
More recent borrowings have retained their clusters, for example 'presidentti' = 'president'. However, it is common to hear these clusters eroded in speech ("resitentti") particularly, though not exclusively, by Finns who have little or no Swedish or English and who are not used to making sounds for letters such as d, c or x.
Note that in the sections below, wherever 'a' is mentioned, 'ä' should also be understood, depending on vowel harmony.
Vowel phonemes /a/, /e/, /i/, /o/, /u/
Finnish has no voiced plosives in native words - with the exception of /d/ that developed from /D/ (as in English 'the').
Without /d/, Finnish has (in native words) no distinctive voice at all.
/h/, /l/, /m/, /n/, /N/, /r/, /s/, /v/
[S] (as English 'sh') and [f] only appear in non-native words.
The following is a partial list of strong -> weak correspondences:
Note that in any given grammatical situation, the consonant can grade either way depending on the word involved. Here are some examples:
There are rare exceptions to the general rule, some of which are noted in the noun cases section.
Some example word pairs:
Table of contents
1 Phonetics
Phonetics Vowels
Like the Turkish language, Finnish has vowel harmony, i.e. only certain designated vowels can appear together in a morpheme.
'i' and 'e' are neutral vowels, but front vowels 'y ö ä' never mix with back vowels 'u o a';
e.g., 'tyttö' = 'girl' is a possible Finnish morpheme because it has only front vowels, whereas *tytto is impossible because it has both front and back vowels.
Consonants
Consonant phonemes /k/, /p/, /t/, /d/
Consonant gradation
The consonant preceding the inflection of a word (either noun or verb) is subject to consonant gradation. Broadly, a consonant will adopt a 'strong' form if the following syllable is 'open' - containing a double vowel or not ending in a consonant - and a 'weak' form otherwise.
Length
All phonemes except /v, d, N, j/ have distinctive length except in dialects.
Stress
Like Hungarian, Finnish always places the stress on the first syllable of a word.