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Hindi · Pronunciation Guide
How do you pronounce "किताब" in Hindi?
ki-TAAB — a dry k, a short lax i, a dental t, and a long aa closed by a voiced b.
kitaab
A light syllable feeding a heavy one, so the weight is unmistakably at the end. Both consonants in the word are ones English aspirates by default, and removing that breath is what makes the light syllable genuinely light.
Listen: किताब
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Sound it out
Hear it in a sentence
मैं एक दिलचस्प किताब पढ़ रहा हूँ।
Maiṁ ek dilchasp kitaab paṛh rahaa hooṁ.
I am reading an interesting book.
Listen: मैं एक दिलचस्प किताब पढ़ रहा हूँ।
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"Maiṁ ek dilchasp kitaab paṛh rahaa hooṁ" pairs kitaab with dilchasp, another Persian compound, and then uses the bare stem paṛh with its breathy retroflex flap ढ़. The verb is by far the hardest sound in the sentence.
Where English speakers slip
The medial t gets alveolar articulation and, in American speech, often becomes a flap between vowels — landing near ड़ in Hindi terms. It must be a full dental stop. The final b also tends to devoice toward p; keep it buzzing until you release.