Danish Orthography

English orthography is highly irregular. This is also the case with French. Another language with an orthography that is not so phonetic is that of Danish.

In Danish word-initial plosives are always voiceless. The word du (you ) is pronounced with a voiceless alveolar plosive. The words ti (ten) and de (they) both have voiceless plosives. The difference is that the plosive of ti (ten) is aspirated and the plosive of de (they) is not.

The word hvad (what) is pronounced with a silent h. The word-final d can be pronounced, but many speakers do not pronounce it. In the word aldrig (never), the g is silent.

The word det (it) has a silent t. In the word af (of), the f is silent, and in the word suppe (soup) the letters pp are pronounced [b].

In the word jeg (I), the g is silent and the vowel e is actually a diphthong which sounds similar to the diphthong in the English word my. The same diphthong is used in the word mig [me], which also has a silent g. The word de is not pronounced as it is written. It consists of a voiceless plosive and high front vowel and is transcribed [ti].

From the examples, it is clear that Danish orthography is irregular. It has many silent letters, intervocalic voicing and no voiced plosives in word-initial position. Danish spelling is thus not a reliable guide to pronunciation.