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Pronunciation
Philosophers and Horses in the Jungle of German Pronunciation

12

Formal German
English
Vocabulary
Grammar Points

2
2
2
3

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Formal German
Example sentence
Slow example

Quatsch! Schlaue Philosophen reisen nicht auf Pferden in den

Dschungel.
Quatsch! Schlaue Philosophen reisen nicht auf Pferden in den
Dschungel.

English
Example sentence
Slow example

Nonsense! Smart philosophers don't travel on horses into the jungle.

Nonsense! Smart philosophers don't travel on horses into the jungle.

Vocabulary
German
Quatsch
Chat

Dschungel

English
nonsense
chat (only online!),
chatroom
jungle

schlau
schlagen

smart
to beat, hit

adjective & adverb

verb

Pferd
Apfel
Physik
Philosophie

horse
apple
physics
philosophy

noun
noun
noun
noun

noun
noun
noun

Notes
masculine
masculine; plural: Chats
masculine; plural is the
same
er schlgt, er schlug, er
hat geschlagen
neuter; plural: Pferde
masculine; plural: pfel
feminine
feminine

Vocabulary Sample Sentences

Das ist Quatsch!
That's nonsense!
Fernsehen ist auch nicht mehr das was es mal war. Television isn't all it used to be, either. Who wants
Wer will schon Berhmtheiten im Dschungel
to see some celebreties in the jungel?
sehen?
Das hat er ganz schlau gelst.
He solved that in a really smart way.

LC: P_L12_12109

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2009-12-01

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Wenn man ihn rgert, schlgt er leicht zu.

When you annoy him, he's quick to start hitting

you.
Sie liebt es, frh am Morgen ein Pferd zu reiten. She loves to ride a horse in the early morning.
Es ist sehr schwer geworden ein Schaukelpferd zu It has become very difficult to find a
finden.
rocking-horse.
Physik und Mathematik sind die Fcher, die ich Physics and maths are the subjects that I like least.
am wenigsten mag.
Du studierst Philosophie? Was willst du denn
You study philosophy? What do you want to do
spter einmal werden?
for a living later?

Grammar Points
The focus of this lesson is the pronunciation of the remaining German letter combinations.
Quatsch! Schlaue Philosophen reisen nicht auf Pferden in den Dschungel.
"Nonsense! Smart philosophers don't travel on horses into the jungle."

Today we shall talk about several other consonant combinations that sometimes pose a problem to
English speakers.

TSCH First a T sound and then a SCH sound. It's much like the English CH in chat, except you
mustn't forget that the German T is aspirated, and it stays aspirated in this combination. Actually,
German has adopted the English word chat, and it's pronounced Chat, in a curious mix of German
and English pronunciation. A German example word for the TSCH is Quatsch (nonsense).
DSCH Same as TSCH, except with a D in front. This resembles the English J in jungle. This
combination is actually not often used, but it does appear in the German word for jungle, Dschungel.
SCHL First a SCH sound and then one of those distinct German L sounds. For some reason,
Germans are famous in France for this consonant combination. It appears in common words like
schlau (smart) or schlagen (to hit).
PF First a P sound and then an F. This is another combination that is quite common in German and
unknown in English. Example words Pferd (horse) and Apfel (apple).
PH This looks like a consonant combination but it's actually just an indicator that the word was

LC: P_L12_12109

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2009-12-01

GermanPod101.com
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borrowed from Greek. English also has this. PH is pronounced just like a normal F and in the latest
spelling reform, most German words have been adapted to reflect that. For example, Graphik can
now be spelled with an F - Grafik. However, Physik still can't be spelled Fsik.

LC: P_L12_12109

www.GermanPod101.com - All Rights Reserved

2009-12-01