For native Finnish speakers, English pronunciation can present challenges. Several factors make it difficult, from the clustering of consonants to unexpected silent letters and stress shifts. Let's look at some common pronunciation challenges Finns face when speaking English. You can check your own pronunciation for these words by using the table and audiofile at the end of the text.
In English, the combination "sc" can be tricky because it has two main pronunciations. When "sc" appears before "a," "o," "u," or a consonant, it is pronounced with a hard "c” like “k” as in the word "scheme" However, when "sc" comes before "i" or "e," it usually takes on a soft "c" sound, like “s” in "scene" or “scenario”.
The letter "g" also causes confusion for Finns. In English, when "g" comes before "a," "o," "u," or a consonant in the middle of a word, it’s pronounced as a hard "g" sound, as seen in "legal" But when it’s followed by "i" or "e," it’s pronounced more like the "j" sound in "legislation".
English is notorious for its silent letters, which can make words like "sovereign" and "debt" hard to pronounce when we only pronounce the bolded letters. These silent letters often don't have a clear pattern, which can cause confusion. These silent letters often indicate the historic pronunciation which has long since changed.
Finnish has a very regular pattern with the stress always on the first syllable of the word unit. However English has varying and often unpredictable stress patterns. Words like "develop" , “contribute”“vocabulary”and "subsidiary" can be difficult. Additionally, words where the stress shifts between the noun and the verb such as "vary" () and "variety", or“ analyse” and analysis have irregularities that might throw off Finnish speakers.
The largest group of difficult words is consonant clusters. English can have many consonants close together which is a pattern that does not exist in Finnish. For example, words like suggest, phenomenon, strategy, digitalise, initiative, entrepreneur are challenging for Finns, who are used to smoother syllable structures. The king of them all is squirrel, which has regularly been voted the most difficult word to pronounce in English by non-natives. If you can say squirrel feel proud of yourself!
If you would like to know about pronunciation in English please contact Galimatias at https://www.galimatias.com/kielikoulutus