✨Join italki and spread some holiday joy by referring your friends. Refer a friend and get 10€ of italki credit: go.italki.com/katdecember Also, which of these words do you find the hardest to pronounce? Are there any other Finnish words you find difficult to say? Let me know ^-^
11:25 The single g-sound only appears in loan words, but the ŋ-sound in "kuningas" is completely different and native to Finnish language. Actually ŋ is the only sound that doesn't have it's own letter in Finnish alphabet, so while it's spelled "kuningas", you have to always pronounce it as "kuniŋŋas". Same with many other words eg. "lanka" (yarn) is alway pronounced as "laŋka" and the plural "langat" as "laŋŋat".
I struggled a long time trying to pronounce the last name of Finnish Winter War sniper, Simo Häyhä. It is weird to get my mouth to sound "äyhä". People overhearing me practicing this sound might think something is wrong. If you speak Häyhä loud and forcefully, Häyhä sounds like you are making a very loud explosive sneeze or are clearing your throat. I don't think I could pronounce some of these words after eating a lot of ice cream or if my lips were half-frozen in sub-zero weather. I still remain convinced Finnish is a tongue-twister language but it is a beautiful language.
For a Turkish, all of these words are easy to pronounce to me :). For sure, the words are not similar but Turkish and Finnish pronounciations are on the same method.I already love this language and grateful to you for making these kind of videos ^^.
It's interesting that the personal pronoun system (including the phonetics and morphology of the pronouns when you look into it deeper) in Turkic languages is quite similar to Finnic languages.
@@hyhhyUral-Altaic languages have similar language structures. Finnish is a Ural language, and Turkish is an Altaic language. That's why Turkish people can speak Finnish more easily than many others.
For me some double consonants are harder than others. Your example "kuunnella" is quite easy, because the idea of holding/stretching the letter is natural for the nasal and fricative letters l, m, n, r, s and v (if there are any double vv words in Finnish). But then Finnish single vs double plosives, k, p and t, which can't be stretched out in the same way. We saw when you got to kannykkä that some different advise for pronouncing kk is need compared with nn. Some tt and pp examples would be good like käyttää and 2nd person plural verbs (tarvitsette, tapasitte).
Interesting fact is that Kuningas is indeed an ancient loan word from Proto-Germanic "Kuningaz". It has preserved its original form unlike the Germanic languages of today
Moi Kat :) kiitos paljon videosta! among these words the hardest for me are - itsenäisyyspäivä, keskuslämmitys (very useful word!) and jonglöörata of course I will practice!
As a Hungarian, I find Finnish pronunciation relatively easy. Still, I am struggling a little bit with a, ä, and e because, in actual speaking, they feel/sound inconsistent to me.
yeah this is because hungarian doesn't have ä. to pronounce it you sort of have to make a sound halfway between hungarian á and hungarian e. both hungarian é and e sound like finnish e to finns, while á is sort of halfway between finnish ä and a. finnish a is easy to pronounce as it should be close to hungarian a.
As a Taiwanese who learn Finnish here found lots of similar pronunciations like Chinese . for instance the "It-se"here can pronounce ‘’ㄘ‘’（this is what we called ”注音符號‘’）
Well done! I am amazed at your English which is perfect. you must have been raised by an English speaking parent and a Finnish parent. I didn't find any words difficult to pronounce because I use those sounds in French (U) and Italian (R) and German (ö). Is Finnish at all like Hungarian?
@@KatChatsFinnish I did read that Hungarian and Finnish originated as one language. Then I suppose with migration, the languages diverged. I just wonder how much of the language is similar today.
Sometimes i think i hear native finns emphasising on single letters, almost like they are double but not quite.... For example "kirjakieli" i feel like the second k and especially the l are stronger because finnish is spoken with a rythm. Is this nonsense or is it true?
Fortunately, as a Bangla speaker, I have no problem pronouncing double consonants. I struggle wifh Double/long vowels. Although I have heard they used to be a thing in ancient bangla
Hi Kat! After living in Finland for 4 years now, I decided to take the plunge and finally learn Finnish. I found your content entertaining but I'm a bit lost as to how to begin. Do you have a recommendation on which of your videos to watch first for a complete beginner? Kiitos :P
Oh gosh sorry I missed this comment! I would say probably the alphabet videos, maybe the playlist called "question words" or "vocab builder" would have some easier content! :)
I was looking for a specific video (that is not related to language learning) and I found this video. I found it interesting that Pöllö means owl in finnish, in my native language Pollo means chicken, although the pronunciation is drastically different.
As a Finn from Eastern Finland who has also lived on the West Coast and in Helsinki, I've never heard of "jongleerata." I'd say "jonglöörata" is a much more common way to say it. Regarding the word "kuningas," I don't find it particularly special. The "ng" sound in "kuningas" is the same as in the word "English." The letter "Ä" is also quite simple. English has the same sound in words like "cat," "hat," or "ass." For comparison: "Hard" = a, "Cat" = ä. When it comes to another Finnish specialty, "ö," if you speak English, you are using the sound all the time. English words like "heard," "verb," "turd," and "sure" are examples of how "ö" pretty much sounds. Great video though. We Finns should be prouder of our weird ass language!
How would a Finnish speaker pronounce the word "llantu"? I have the hypothesis that it is impossible to pronounce the ll sound at the beginning of a word
Well, if that is a Spanish word, I would pronounce is as ijantu. In it the j is really j and not h. Watching a lot of La Liga matches you learn how to pronounce the names...
The lexical root of this word is *järjestelmä* 'system'. Prefix *epä* means negation. Then there is suffix that appear in adjective *järjestelmällinen* 'systematic'. *tyttä* shows that this would be a verb, but there are more derivative suffixes after it. There is again negation element, *mätön* , similar to negative participle *tekemätön työ* 'job not done'. Suffix *yys* shows that this is substantive, like in word *hyvyys* ' feature of goodness'. *llä* is adessive case, then there is 3. person possessive suffix and few enclitic particles (kään, kö, hän). So, what does this mean? I would say that it is a question (kö) about somebody showing his/her feature of not being unsystematic. So, it actually means nothing but is theoretically possible form, which nobody would ever use. It is so theoretical that when I first time saw it as a child (native speaker), I thought that this can't be correct, no way! By learning it you may learn Finnish derivation, but it is more like conjoined for fun. 🙂
@@mikahamari6420 whatta...🤯 Thanks for the explanation, so basically it's a nonsense tongue twister that exploits the peculiarities of finnish grammar.
@@cosimoleone9110 Exactly, it is not at all a normal word in Finnish language, because words are for use and this will never be. Theoretical word shows the morphological type of Finnish, how words can be prolonged by using affixes (this is called agglutination).
Lol that moment 1:58 how i pretend to talk when i want to see myself busy 8:12 i don't know why but i remember ismo joke on pronounciation 9:13 Herra pöllö- Duolingo
As virolainen to pronounce isn't so bad, but reading it gives me eye cancer . They're written so funny. :D pohjoinen/põhja, höyry/aur, joulupukki sounds so cute, we say jouluvana, kuunella/kuulma, pöllö/öökull, keskuslämmitys/keskküte, itsenäisyyspäivä/iseseisvuspäev , jongleerata/jongleerima. You're super cute btw. 😳
I’ve used it! All my teachers so far have been super sweet and kind. The taster lesson is to kinda see if you vibe with them and go over what you want to learn and how they can help you. Then you can decide if you want to continue or not :p
don't really wanna brag but having 7 vowels and 26 consonants with about 50+ alphabets in my mother tongue made it easier for me to pick up other language and their pronunciations 😅
I have to address the elephant in the room. She says AamuyÄllä instead of aamuyÖllä. She says LyiJJY instead of Lyijy. She says RovaniÄmi instead of Rovaniemi. She sayd YÄpöytä instead of Yöpöytä.
@@KatChatsFinnish Siis olen minäkin noin puhunut lapsena, sitten se pikkuhiljaa parantuu kun on vähän pakko töissä puhua oikein ettei vaikuta ihan juntilta :) Siis kyllähän esim hämäläiset saattavat vielä aikuisenakin puhua noin. Ymmärrän jos et itse kuule eroa, ja en väitä puhuvani yhtään selkeämmin arkielämässä. Oma murteeni on kamalaa solkotusta (stadilainen). En silti väitä että suomalaiset puhuu niin. Pisti vaan korvaan kun tämä on ns opetusvideo.
✨Join italki and spread some holiday joy by referring your friends. Refer a friend and get 10€ of italki credit: go.italki.com/katdecember
Also, which of these words do you find the hardest to pronounce? Are there any other Finnish words you find difficult to say? Let me know ^-^
Lyijy was one really hard
@@marin_1441 try one - talossammekohan🙃
11:25 The single g-sound only appears in loan words, but the ŋ-sound in "kuningas" is completely different and native to Finnish language.
Actually ŋ is the only sound that doesn't have it's own letter in Finnish alphabet, so while it's spelled "kuningas", you have to always pronounce it as "kuniŋŋas". Same with many other words eg. "lanka" (yarn) is alway pronounced as "laŋka" and the plural "langat" as "laŋŋat".
Well the ŋ appears alot in English as a contraction of the -ing suffix. People can't be bothered to say /wɔ:kɪŋɡ/ so they just say /wɔ:kɪŋ/
You are really good in explaining.. 😍
Big thanks for the great video!
Kiitos!
Football World cup is ongoing. If possible, please teach us some Finnish words for football match. Thanks.
I struggled a long time trying to pronounce the last name of Finnish Winter War sniper, Simo Häyhä. It is weird to get my mouth to sound "äyhä". People overhearing me practicing this sound might think something is wrong. If you speak Häyhä loud and forcefully, Häyhä sounds like you are making a very loud explosive sneeze or are clearing your throat.
I don't think I could pronounce some of these words after eating a lot of ice cream or if my lips were half-frozen in sub-zero weather. I still remain convinced Finnish is a tongue-twister language but it is a beautiful language.
For a Turkish, all of these words are easy to pronounce to me :). For sure, the words are not similar but Turkish and Finnish pronounciations are on the same method.I already love this language and grateful to you for making these kind of videos ^^.
It's interesting that the personal pronoun system (including the phonetics and morphology of the pronouns when you look into it deeper) in Turkic languages is quite similar to Finnic languages.
@@hyhhyUral-Altaic languages have similar language structures. Finnish is a Ural language, and Turkish is an Altaic language. That's why Turkish people can speak Finnish more easily than many others.
@@mahiruskan The "Altaic" or "Ural-Altaic" languages seem like some sort of an ancient "Sprachbund" group. It is an interesting product of history.
Ei ole hirveän vaikeaa. Ainakaan näin aamuyöllä. Hyvää yötä, nukutaan hyvin. :)
For me some double consonants are harder than others. Your example "kuunnella" is quite easy, because the idea of holding/stretching the letter is natural for the nasal and fricative letters l, m, n, r, s and v (if there are any double vv words in Finnish). But then Finnish single vs double plosives, k, p and t, which can't be stretched out in the same way. We saw when you got to kannykkä that some different advise for pronouncing kk is need compared with nn. Some tt and pp examples would be good like käyttää and 2nd person plural verbs (tarvitsette, tapasitte).
Yes, a double plosive is an ordinary plosive, but with a longer pause before it. Some languages have this concept, e. g. Russian, Italian, Japanese.
You missed Hääyöaie 🤣
I have to say that all of these are difficult however your video is a great help. Thanks
Glad it was helpful! Kiitos!
Interesting fact is that Kuningas is indeed an ancient loan word from Proto-Germanic "Kuningaz". It has preserved its original form unlike the Germanic languages of today
I wondered about that because king in modern day German is König.
Pöllö...that frickin green owl is at it again.
Lmao
It has been a while since I have been here. Uni is hard 😬 But it is always pleasant to come for a relaxing and informative Finnish lesson. Thank you 🤗
Good luck to you at uni!! Glad to always see your comments when you have a moment to relax :)
Terve! Thank you for your videos.. I'm currently studying finnish language and preparing for the A1 exam..
Kiitos and onnea for your exam!
Kiitos paljon..
Moi Kat :) kiitos paljon videosta!
among these words the hardest for me are - itsenäisyyspäivä, keskuslämmitys (very useful word!) and jonglöörata of course
I will practice!
And I found one more word: päärautatieasema
Hahah I guess there are plenty of them in Finnish xD
As a Hungarian, I find Finnish pronunciation relatively easy. Still, I am struggling a little bit with a, ä, and e because, in actual speaking, they feel/sound inconsistent to me.
yeah this is because hungarian doesn't have ä. to pronounce it you sort of have to make a sound halfway between hungarian á and hungarian e. both hungarian é and e sound like finnish e to finns, while á is sort of halfway between finnish ä and a. finnish a is easy to pronounce as it should be close to hungarian a.
those 'hard' sounds are starting to make sense - öy and yö in one word!!?? it was hilarious getting my tongue around that one 🤣
Awesome!! 👍
Hahaha it’s a bit of a mouthful isn’t it xD
As a Taiwanese who learn Finnish here found lots of similar pronunciations like Chinese . for instance the "It-se"here can pronounce ‘’ㄘ‘’（this is what we called ”注音符號‘’）
Well done! I am amazed at your English which is perfect. you must have been raised by an English speaking parent and a Finnish parent.
I didn't find any words difficult to pronounce because I use those sounds in French (U) and Italian (R) and German (ö). Is Finnish at all like Hungarian?
I think Hungarian is like a distant cousin
@@KatChatsFinnish I did read that Hungarian and Finnish originated as one language. Then I suppose with migration, the languages diverged. I just wonder how much of the language is similar today.
@@Robinicat Well I can't understand it at all so it's different enough we don't understand each other
Kat!!! I learned Finnish well today.👍 It's cold, so dress warmly. And be careful not to catch a cold.😁😊
Thank you so much! :)
Sometimes i think i hear native finns emphasising on single letters, almost like they are double but not quite....
For example "kirjakieli" i feel like the second k and especially the l are stronger because finnish is spoken with a rythm.
Is this nonsense or is it true?
I find the pronunciation the least difficult about this language, but maybe that’s because I think it’s a very beautiful language.
Yeah! Also probably depends on your native language too, some just find it harder than others
@@KatChatsFinnish But still Finnish is very difficult for me. Kiitos Kat 😉. Btw I am Dutch.
Kiitos!🎉
Fortunately, as a Bangla speaker, I have no problem pronouncing double consonants.
I struggle wifh Double/long vowels. Although I have heard they used to be a thing in ancient bangla
Hi Kat! After living in Finland for 4 years now, I decided to take the plunge and finally learn Finnish. I found your content entertaining but I'm a bit lost as to how to begin. Do you have a recommendation on which of your videos to watch first for a complete beginner? Kiitos :P
Oh gosh sorry I missed this comment! I would say probably the alphabet videos, maybe the playlist called "question words" or "vocab builder" would have some easier content! :)
I was looking for a specific video (that is not related to language learning) and I found this video.
I found it interesting that Pöllö means owl in finnish, in my native language Pollo means chicken, although the pronunciation is drastically different.
Oh that's true xD
As a Finn from Eastern Finland who has also lived on the West Coast and in Helsinki, I've never heard of "jongleerata." I'd say "jonglöörata" is a much more common way to say it.
Regarding the word "kuningas," I don't find it particularly special. The "ng" sound in "kuningas" is the same as in the word "English."
The letter "Ä" is also quite simple. English has the same sound in words like "cat," "hat," or "ass." For comparison: "Hard" = a, "Cat" = ä.
When it comes to another Finnish specialty, "ö," if you speak English, you are using the sound all the time. English words like "heard," "verb," "turd," and "sure" are examples of how "ö" pretty much sounds.
Great video though. We Finns should be prouder of our weird ass language!
Kiitos paljon tästä hyvästä videosta! I notice again that for me (french speaker), english is very more difficult to pronounce than finnish 😱!!
I noticed the way you pronounced "y" in "lyijy" and "höyry" sounds different. How does that work?
Moi! i need some help with finnish riddles. i hope i can find one here
As a Hungarian, all pronunciations were easy. (Very easy.) I stopped the video and said the word before you said it,and I haven't fault.
Wow that’s amazing! Maybe because Hungarian comes from the same langauge family ..? So the pronunciation is more similar
Myrsky, kahvi that type words hard for me
For us people from Slovenia are all this words very easy to pronounce
That's great!
Ensikerralla sitten, lento-kone-suihku-turbiini-moottori-apu-mekaanikko-ali-upseeri-oppilas tai Epä-järjestelmällis-tyttämättömyy-dellänsä-kään-köhän
"Kuningas" is an interesting word. It comes from Proto-Germanic *kuningaz.
How would a Finnish speaker pronounce the word "llantu"? I have the hypothesis that it is impossible to pronounce the ll sound at the beginning of a word
Probably like a one letter l
Well, if that is a Spanish word, I would pronounce is as ijantu. In it the j is really j and not h. Watching a lot of La Liga matches you learn how to pronounce the names...
It just sounds like a long L. No problem in pronouncing even with lllllantu.
Same how we say it in finnish common names like Kalle or Ville.
It's not really a pronunciation thing as such, but the shape you need to make your mouth to pronounce "Turku" is certainly different :D
Now that you mention it, I can feel it too xD
What about epäjärjestelmällistyttämättömyydelläänsäkäänköhän? I wonder what it means. I think there are several words put together 😅
The lexical root of this word is *järjestelmä* 'system'. Prefix *epä* means negation. Then there is suffix that appear in adjective *järjestelmällinen* 'systematic'. *tyttä* shows that this would be a verb, but there are more derivative suffixes after it. There is again negation element, *mätön* , similar to negative participle *tekemätön työ* 'job not done'. Suffix *yys* shows that this is substantive, like in word *hyvyys* ' feature of goodness'. *llä* is adessive case, then there is 3. person possessive suffix and few enclitic particles (kään, kö, hän).
So, what does this mean? I would say that it is a question (kö) about somebody showing his/her feature of not being unsystematic. So, it actually means nothing but is theoretically possible form, which nobody would ever use. It is so theoretical that when I first time saw it as a child (native speaker), I thought that this can't be correct, no way! By learning it you may learn Finnish derivation, but it is more like conjoined for fun. 🙂
@@mikahamari6420 whatta...🤯
Thanks for the explanation, so basically it's a nonsense tongue twister that exploits the peculiarities of finnish grammar.
@@cosimoleone9110 Exactly, it is not at all a normal word in Finnish language, because words are for use and this will never be. Theoretical word shows the morphological type of Finnish, how words can be prolonged by using affixes (this is called agglutination).
Minulla yöpöydällä oli voileipää makaran ja juuston kanssa. Se oli aamuyöllä.😁
Vau!
Lol that moment 1:58 how i pretend to talk when i want to see myself busy
8:12 i don't know why but i remember ismo joke on pronounciation
9:13 Herra pöllö- Duolingo
Hahahah, I guess have done that too xD
Kalliit hinnat sulla ?
These are easy! It might be because I'm Finnish, but it's not so important difference
Kiitos
As virolainen to pronounce isn't so bad, but reading it gives me eye cancer . They're written so funny. :D pohjoinen/põhja, höyry/aur, joulupukki sounds so cute, we say jouluvana, kuunella/kuulma, pöllö/öökull, keskuslämmitys/keskküte, itsenäisyyspäivä/iseseisvuspäev , jongleerata/jongleerima. You're super cute btw. 😳
Yess it's always so close but still so different xD
Anyone using italki? Please share your experience 🙏
I’ve used it! All my teachers so far have been super sweet and kind. The taster lesson is to kinda see if you vibe with them and go over what you want to learn and how they can help you. Then you can decide if you want to continue or not :p
Look for "kuningaz" to find the origin of the word.
Minun lempimämpi sana on kälsärikännit😁
Kalsarikännit,varmaan tarkoitit tätä😀
don't really wanna brag but having 7 vowels and 26 consonants with about 50+ alphabets in my mother tongue made it easier for me to pick up other language and their pronunciations 😅
That's a great benefit haha!
Hyvä itsenäisestipäivä
Kiitos paljon!
I have to address the elephant in the room.
She says AamuyÄllä instead of aamuyÖllä.
She says LyiJJY instead of Lyijy.
She says RovaniÄmi instead of Rovaniemi.
She sayd YÄpöytä instead of Yöpöytä.
I say it how Finnish people say it. I’m Finnish so I don’t get it xD
@@KatChatsFinnish Siis olen minäkin noin puhunut lapsena, sitten se pikkuhiljaa parantuu kun on vähän pakko töissä puhua oikein ettei vaikuta ihan juntilta :)
Siis kyllähän esim hämäläiset saattavat vielä aikuisenakin puhua noin.
Ymmärrän jos et itse kuule eroa, ja en väitä puhuvani yhtään selkeämmin arkielämässä. Oma murteeni on kamalaa solkotusta (stadilainen). En silti väitä että suomalaiset puhuu niin.
Pisti vaan korvaan kun tämä on ns opetusvideo.
The opening of diphtongs is a Western dialect thing.
ö, u, and y are all very similar
Mutta se on mukava kuunneella sinua
Post-vocalic "h" is a tough one for me to pronounce.
Yes, all nähdä forms are hard because of that
Are you a native speaker? 😊
I am :)
Hei ❤ toivottavasti 🧡 kaikilla 💛 on 💚 hyvä 💙 päivä
Kiitos ja samoin!
Terve 🤭😜🤫
It is not YÄLLÄ but yÖllä
izi
This video made me question the Finnish language. - Finnish person
Lmao
Голимая реклама. В финском языке нет и быть не может проблем с произношением.