• JovialMicrobial@lemm.ee
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    7
    ·
    2 months ago

    Quick question! I live in a town in the US that was heavily settled by Finnish people. Meaning saunas are kinda normal for the area and you see Finnish flags flying alongside the US ones.

    Point is that I was told it’s pronounced SOW-na. Sow pronounced like “OW.” Is that true or are the Finnish-Americans fucking with me?

    • Hotzilla
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      7
      ·
      edit-2
      2 months ago

      It is correct, sow-na might be hard because not sure do people know how to pronounce sow (female pig) correctly :). Other maybe better example is of “sour” without the r, and adding “na” on the end.

      https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=IRtxq2qug7w

    • sparkle@lemm.ee
      link
      fedilink
      Cymraeg
      arrow-up
      3
      ·
      2 months ago

      Finnish spelling is very consistent with its phonology. “a” and “u” are pronounced kind of similar to as they are in Italian or Spanish or something, except further back in the mouth. So yes