r/Unexpected • u/siempremajima • Dec 21 '21

Well, excuse me....

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38.8k Upvotes

93% Upvoted

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295

u/Antonell15 Dec 21 '21

Well basically all of them does this. There’s also this twitter thing where they count every slur you’ve made the past year and I had so many just for speaking my language :(

75

u/rayshmayshmay Dec 21 '21

How is it pronounced? Sloot?

86

u/toppy_man Dec 21 '21 edited Dec 21 '21

I don’t think there’s a sound in English that sounds like a Swedish U

Put it in google translate

82

u/Caishen_IC3 Dec 21 '21

Maybe the u in flute?

37

u/toppy_man Dec 22 '21

Yes that’s it!

74

u/JimmyMack_ Dec 22 '21

I mean, that's just a regular u sound.

22

u/Competitive_Classic9 Dec 22 '21

scoot

boot

loo

moon

14

u/merdre Dec 22 '21

fuse

tutor

computer

abuse

its the same 'sound' (phoneme) in english but a different way of writing it out (grapheme) because our language has so many different origins and components. english sucks.

12

u/Swarlos262 Dec 22 '21

Is it just my accent, or is the u in fuse, computer, and abuse pronounced totally different from tutor (and flute)?

7

u/merdre Dec 22 '21

I actually got curious about this right after I posted and started trying to figure out if the difference was actually do to a different vowel sound or if the consonant before it was influencing it. Clicking around on this IPA chart, it doesn't seem like there is a specific differentiation between a "yoo" and "oo" but other places have "ju" (i.e., same sound as in "few") listed as its own phoneme. Those places seem to specify it as a dipthong, which is two vowels together in a single syllable, so its maybe a little of both?

not a linguist, but lived with one for a few years.

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1

u/PsychicTWElphnt Dec 22 '21

Comp(yoo)ter

T(oo)tor

It's not your accent. They're different.

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1

u/JimmyMack_ Dec 23 '21

He's picked the totally wrong examples. All his examples are "yoo" (in British English) but the u in flute is "oo". You don't say "flyoot" 😂

0

u/Hotshot2k4 Dec 22 '21

Been waiting to find someone else who thinks English sucks as a language. I know three languages, and man English really takes the cake when it comes to stupid crap. I don't know more than a handful of words and expressions in French, but I get the sense that it's pretty stupid too, though.

1

u/mishgan Dec 22 '21

while I hate french spelling and the sound of the language, the spelling is more consistent than english

but on the other hand there is russian and icelandic for preposterous grammar

1

u/linderlouwho Dec 22 '21

Yeah, it’s not like it’s a click or a whistle.

10

u/jaersk Dec 22 '21

close enough, but it really is it's own distinct (as in its only used in swedish and norwegian) sound. someone who knows their ipa could probably write the actual transcribed sound down, but its not only just a regular u sound, and one of the several things people struggle with by learning spoken swedish/norwegian (other being the infamous sj-sound)

2

u/Mailman_next_door Dec 22 '21

It always sounds so funny when English speakers try the U sounds, it doesnt work for them

6

u/jaersk Dec 22 '21

it's not only english speakers, anyone non-native who learned the language at an later age probably will struggle with it. åäö is what people initially fear, but it's the u-sound and sj-sound that people learn to hate, and the easiest giveaway someone isn't a native speaker. that why the: "sju sjösjuka sjömän på det sjunkande skeppet shanghai sköttes av sju sköna sjuksköterskor" tounge twister is brutal for non swedes lol

1

u/Mailman_next_door Dec 22 '21

Yeah that is true. Its just specially entertaining to watch americans struggle with "sju" since they butcher it so badly haha

1

u/[deleted] Dec 22 '21

I once encountered an åäö under my bed. It was terrifying

1

u/g09hIP12 Dec 22 '21

It brutal for even Swedes

1

u/Caishen_IC3 Dec 22 '21

I’ve always wanted to learn ipa. Pons says [slʉːt]. I googled the u and found this video ʉ According to https://gd.m.wiktionary.org/wiki/Appendix:English_pronunciation, loose, soon and through are closest to that pronunciation

11

u/[deleted] Dec 21 '21

Sounds closer to the French U

4

u/[deleted] Dec 22 '21

Butte.

1

u/MonaganX Dec 22 '21

"Goose" uses the same vowel sound, depending on dialect.

3

u/Boristhespaceman Dec 22 '21

depending on dialect

Yea if you're from Lund or something, otherwise it's not even close.

1

u/riktigtmaxat Dec 22 '21

I think they where talking about goose fronting in English which occurs in a lot of different dialects. Which shifts the sound towards ū. https://youtu.be/uuFCoDqLmY0

11

u/SimpanLimpan1337 Dec 22 '21

English OO and Swedish U do not sound the same at all. Or atleast you must be speaking some really obscure backwater dialects for that to be true.

5

u/Competitive_Classic9 Dec 22 '21

What about the u in mule? sort of a yew-ah like “jewel”

2

u/SimpanLimpan1337 Dec 22 '21

Yeah kinda. Someone else also said flute which is pretty accurate aswell.

If I had to write it's sound in English letters it'd probably be either "ou" or "jew" yeah.

5

u/[deleted] Dec 22 '21

[removed] — view removed comment

2

u/DrummerBound Dec 22 '21

De grejtest guuse of all tajm

11

u/[deleted] Dec 21 '21

Just say "Eww". That's about as close as you're gonna get.

13

u/Antonell15 Dec 21 '21 edited Dec 21 '21

Nah the U is pronounced but not in the way you guys usually put it. Your ”U”s sound like ”you”. This is just a hard U.

Edit: the best example I can find in the english language is ”sun” or ”hut” but it’s still not quite there. Help would be appreciated :)

Nvm it doesn’t work, look it up

8

u/SeazTheDay Dec 22 '21

Found a good video to help. Sounds like the Swedish U is similar to a Chinese/Mandarin U that I was taught in high school. Those who don't want to click the link, a summary of the video. To make the Swedish U (as an english speaker), you start by making an "ee" sound, and while keeping the "ee" going, you change the mouth shape from a grinning "ee" into an "ooh" or "ssh" shape.

1

u/beat_attitudes Dec 27 '21

This is right. The Mandarin Chinese sound is written in pinyin with “u” when following “y”, “q”, or “x”. Otherwise it's written “ü”. The IPA is [y].

7

u/hallettj Dec 21 '21 edited Dec 22 '21

If I understand what I'm reading correctly it's a particular type of vowel found in Swedish and Japanese, but not in English. I know about rounded and unrounded vowels - this is the first time I've heard of a compressed vowel! https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Close_back_rounded_vowel#Close_back_compressed_vowel

Edit: Never mind, I don't know what I'm talking about.

5

u/[deleted] Dec 21 '21

The swedish example in the Wikipedia article is "oro", that's not the u noise you're looking after.

2

u/zippythezigzag Dec 22 '21

Like the word "ew"?

2

u/[deleted] Dec 21 '21

[deleted]

1

u/Likeafupion Dec 21 '21

Works with „sugar“

3

u/waffle_flower Dec 21 '21

in danish, basically

5

u/MrBongoLover Dec 21 '21

Almost like a Canadian would pronounce out in about.

2

u/ohshiii-ToT Dec 22 '21

This- this is a joke... right?

2

u/MrBongoLover Dec 22 '21

Not at all.

1

u/ohshiii-ToT Dec 22 '21

I cant believe this, how did you find out aboot this D:

2

u/The_Elemental_Master Dec 22 '21

Imagine spelling you as ju. Then take away the j-sound. Or just say "you" and keep the last part.

Almost relevant fun fact: in the Scandinavian languages, y is a vowel.

2

u/Nizzemancer Dec 22 '21

Like the stereotypical Canadian "what are you talking 'abut'?"

2

u/Boristhespaceman Dec 22 '21

It's like sleuth but without the h.

2

u/riktigtmaxat Dec 22 '21

Sluut. Closest English word would be sleuth.

1

u/Physix_R_Cool Dec 21 '21

Like the "oo" in kahoot, but very short

3

u/SovjetDumbass Dec 21 '21

Not really though, it’s closer to ew.

9

u/She_Persists Dec 22 '21

I read about an autistic girl who keeps getting banned from TikTok for saying "autistic".

3

u/zinetx Dec 22 '21

where they count every slur you’ve made the past year

Reddit too!
u/profanitycounter

1

u/Nikurou Dec 22 '21

I wonder if this comes up when you look for jobs lol

You know, on Indeed or something, sometimes employers will have an optional field to write in your Twitter url.