SLOVENIAN PHONOLOGY Slovenian alphabet has 25 letters: A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P R S T U V Z .

. (pronounced <>), (pronounced <y>), (pronounced <t>) and (pronounced <d>) are used only in proper names. Along with those letters another five are used in Slovenian texts: (pronounced <>), Q (pronounced <k>), W (pronounced <u>, <v> or <w>), X (pronounced <ks>) and Y (pronounced <i> or <j>). Different characters from all other scripts are transcribed into one of these letters. Phonetic symbols are those of The International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA).

CONSONANTS IPA b d dz d f g h x j k l m n p Examples biti, obala, snob dim, veda, red, svatba, petdeset odzadaj, odziv, koc deda dungla, pidama, ubenik fant, afekt, graf gora, igra, grog, kdaj, vsakdo nevihta, nihe hotel, ohol, prah jek, objem, ion, socialen kje, okno, vlak, krogca, prag lep, ploskev, sel kralj, poljski, bolji, vabljiv miza, pomen, sem imve, nimfa, tramvaj nebo, vrana, sin banka, sinko, gong njiva, sanjski, knjiga, konj pot, spis, rep, obi, hrib

r s t ts t v z

red, prav, kar siv, rosa, res, nizko, razstava e, mot, pe, teko, izolan tam, stol, pot, sladko, odtod cel, ocet, muc, bratski, odslej as, sreka, pro, odel, brid voz, vreme, govor zid, prazen, glasba ep, roa, je, izeti, veda

h is pronounced <x> save before voiceless consonants and after i when <h>. lj are pronounced <lj> save before consonants, i and at the end of a word when < >. l is pronounced as <u> in past participles and sometimes in other words. m is pronounced <> before f and v; n is pronounced <> before g and k. nj are pronounced <nj> save before consonants, i and at the end of a word when <>. Slovenian r is always rolled like Italian or Spanish.

ASPIRATED CONSONANTS IPA g k Examples Glej!, Kdo? Kar!, Kje?

g and k are aspirated in short imperatives and interrogatives.

NASALIZED D AND T IPA d t Examples dno tnalo

LATERAL D AND T IPA d t Examples dleto tlak

APPROXIMANTS IPA Examples w v enem, uigran, suita, ivljenje, mavrah vsak, vhod, sivka

<w> is pronounced before vowels as well as j, l and r, while <> before consonants.

VOWELS IPA Examples i e a o u i e a o u list, rei, smer, serijski, junij moj, majski (only in diphthongs) spet, peko prej, mejni, lev (only in diphthongs) en, kmet, ele (alternative pronunciation: ) brat, lipa snop, post (alternative pronunciation: ) as, razpoka, enam, joga obraz, potem kos, samo lu, kmalu, trl, predvsem pes, p[]rst, []rt, fil[]mski, him[]nski biti, vera, lij peti, mesec meja, ofer mati, sam okno, voda (alternative pronunciation: o) osem, moda ura, muha, plul

Slovenian terminology of vowels kratki i dvoglasniki i ozki kratki e iroki kratki e iroki kratki naglaeni e kratki a iroki kratki o polglasniki a iroki kratki nenaglaeni o ozki kratki o kratki u kratki polglasnik dolgi i ozki dolgi e iroki dolgi e dolgi a iroki dolgi o ozki dolgi o dolgi u

temen, megla (alternative pronunciation: ) dolgi polglasnik

<> is always pronounced before syllabic l, m, n, and r. <> denotes long vowel.

DIPHTHONGS IPA Examples a a a au e eu u u u o ou u (i) aeroklub maj naokrog nauk, prav, igral dejstvo bel, sev poglej preobrat lev posel iskriv, bil vojna soj poudarek, nov, polletni, stol ujma kalij (usually pronounced as <i> or <i>)

Letters ij could be a diphthong only at the end of a word and before consonants, otherwise they are always pronounced as <ij>. Double (geminated) characters are always pronounced lenghtened though they do not necessarily have the exactly same phonetic vowel value or contain the same letter (the latter is so-called voicing or consonantal assimilation), e.g.: priimek /priimek/, vseeno /sn/, radij /radi()/, sij /si/, izza /izza/, petdeset /peddest/, razstava /rsstava/, izsek /issek/. Voicing assimilation is also quite common between two words, e.g.: stric Beno /stridzben/, rob poti /roppti/, saj jem /sajjem/, pot domov /poddomou/, vsak dan /sagdan/, glas doni /glazdni/. <> denotes stress placed on the next vowel. Pronunciation of vowels does not follow clear rules. Long vowels are always stressed (stress could be either primary or secondary).