Dutch · Pronunciation Guide

How do you pronounce "het raam" in Dutch?

ut RAHM — a quick Dutch r, a long open "aah," and a closing m.

het raam /ət ˈraːm/

One beat dominated by its long vowel. The plural "ramen" drops one a as the syllable opens and adds a schwa, and the accent stays exactly where it was — the same alternation as "kaas/kazen" and "straat/straten."

Listen: het raam

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Sound it out

r Either a tongue-tip flick or a soft back scrape, both standard. The crucial thing is that it stays a brief consonant rather than bleeding into the vowel.

aa Wide open and held at full length. The whole word is essentially this vowel with a consonant at each end.

m Lips fully closed at the end, held briefly. Dutch does not let the vowel trail off nasalised.

Hear it in a sentence

Ik kijk uit het raam.

I'm looking out of the window.

Listen: Ik kijk uit het raam.

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"Ik kijk uit het raam" splits the phrasal expression "uit het raam kijken," and "uit" here has its rounded ui diphthong. So the sentence contains one difficult vowel just before the easy long "aah" of the noun.

Where English speakers slip

An American r at the start colours the whole vowel and shortens it, which is the main damage. Keep the r brief and let the "aah" ring. Learners also confuse "raam" with "ram" — vowel length is the only difference, and the short version means a battering ram or a male sheep.