Dutch · Pronunciation Guide

How do you pronounce "houden van" in Dutch?

Q: How do you pronounce houden van in Dutch?

houden van is pronounced with the stress described below. In IPA it is written /ˈɦʌudə(n) vɑn/. It means “to love.” HOW-duh fahn — the ou is the diphthong of "house," and the phrase means "to love" only when "van" is attached.

HOW-duh fahn — the ou is the diphthong of "house," and the phrase means "to love" only when "van" is attached.

houden van /ˈɦʌudə(n) vɑn/

The verb carries the beat and "van" is a weightless tail: HOU-den-van. In a real sentence the preposition often ends up far from the verb, and it stays unstressed wherever it lands — its job is grammatical, not rhythmic.

Listen: houden van

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Sound it out

h Voiced and soft, with the throat humming rather than puffing.

ou A diphthong starting near an open "ah" and gliding toward "oo," broadly like English "house." Dutch spells this same sound both "ou" and "au," one sound with two spellings.

d Voiced between vowels, and in fast speech many Dutch speakers weaken it toward a w-like glide — "houwe" — which is standard casual pronunciation.

van A separate word: lightly-voiced v and a short open "ah." It is unstressed, hanging off the verb rather than standing on its own.

Hear it in a sentence

Ik hou van jou.

I love you.

Listen: Ik hou van jou.

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"Ik hou van jou" uses the shortened stem "hou" (the -d is routinely dropped in the first person) and puts the emphatic pronoun "jou" at the end where the melody peaks. Without "van," "ik hou" would mean "I hold" — the preposition is what makes it a declaration of love.

Where English speakers slip

Learners drop the "van" and say "ik hou jou," which lands somewhere between "I hold you" and nonsense. The diphthong is the phonetic issue: English speakers reading "ou" often produce the "oo" of "you" or the "oh" of "soul," when Dutch wants the two-part glide of "how." And the v of "van" should be soft, close to f.