(, "stage German") or (, "stage pronunciation") is a unified set of pronunciation rules for the

German German(s) may refer to: * Germany (of or related to) **Germania (historical use) * Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language ** For citizens of Germany, see also German nationality law **Ger ...

literary language A literary language is the form (register) of a language used in written literature, which can be either a nonstandard dialect or a standardized variety of the language. Literary language sometimes is noticeably different from the spoken langu ...

used in the

theatre Theatre or theater is a collaborative form of performing art that uses live performers, usually actors or actresses, to present the experience of a real or imagined event before a live audience in a specific place, often a stage. The perform ...

of the German ''Sprachraum''. Established in the 19th century, it came to be considered pure

High German The High German dialects (german: hochdeutsche Mundarten), or simply High German (); not to be confused with Standard High German which is commonly also called ''High German'', comprise the varieties of German spoken south of the Benrath and ...

. It was codified in the pronouncing dictionary ''Deutsche Bühnenaussprache'', edited by the German scholar

Theodor Siebs Theodor Siebs (; 26 August 1862 – 28 May 1941) was a German linguist most remembered today as the author of '' Deutsche Bühnenaussprache'' ("German stage pronunciation"), published in 1898. The work was largely responsible for setting the stan ...

, and first published in 1898. An artificial standard not corresponding directly to any

dialect The term dialect (from Latin , , from the Ancient Greek word , 'discourse', from , 'through' and , 'I speak') can refer to either of two distinctly different types of Linguistics, linguistic phenomena: One usage refers to a variety (linguisti ...

, Bühnendeutsch is mostly based on the Standard German as spoken in Northern Germany. For example, the suffix '' -ig'' is pronounced .

Sonorants

Three acceptable realizations of

Until 1957, only two pronunciations were allowed: an alveolar trill and an alveolar flap . After 1957, a uvular trill was also allowed. A voiced uvular fricative , used extensively in contemporary Standard German, is not allowed. Therefore, ''rot'' ('red') can be pronounced , and but not .

Rhoticism

The vocalized realization of found in German or Austrian Standard German corresponds to in Bühnendeutsch so ''für'' 'for' is pronounced rather than . Whenever the sequence is vocalized to in German or Austrian Standard German, Bühnendeutsch requires a sequence so ''besser'' 'better' is pronounced rather than . In contemporary Standard German, both of these features are found almost exclusively in Switzerland.

No schwa-elision

Contrary to Standard German, cannot be elided before a sonorant consonant (making it syllabic) so ''Faden'' 'yarn' is pronounced rather than the standard .

Fronting of word-final schwa

In loanwords from

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and

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, the word-final is realized as a short, tense so ''Psyche'' '

psyche Psyche (''Psyché'' in French) is the Greek term for "soul" (ψυχή). Psyche may also refer to: Psychology * Psyche (psychology), the totality of the human mind, conscious and unconscious * ''Psyche'', an 1846 book about the unconscious by Car ...

' is pronounced rather than the standard .

Obstruents

Syllable-final fortition

As in Standard Northern German, syllable-final obstruents written with the letters used also for syllable-initial lenis sounds ( etc.) are realized as fortis so ''Absicht'' 'intention' is pronounced (note the full voicing of , which, in position immediately after a fortis, occurs only in Bühnendeutsch: see below), but ''Bad'' 'bath' is pronounced . The corresponding standard southern (Southern German, Austrian, Swiss) pronunciations contain lenis consonants in that position: and , respectively.

Strong aspiration of

The voiceless plosives are aspirated in the same environments as in Standard German but more strongly, especially to environments in which the Standard German plosives are aspirated moderately and weakly: in unstressed intervocalic and word-final positions. That can be transcribed in the IPA as . The voiceless affricates are unaspirated , as in Standard German.

Complete voicing of lenis obstruents

The lenis obstruents Mangold transcribes the voiced palatal fricative with the symbol : as if it were an

approximant Approximants are speech sounds that involve the articulators approaching each other but not narrowly enough nor with enough articulatory precision to create turbulent airflow. Therefore, approximants fall between fricatives, which do produce a ...

. However, he explicitly states that is the lenis fricative counterpart of the fortis fricative (). It is also worth noting that among the lenis obstruents as well as the fortis counterpart of the () appear only in loanwords. are fully voiced after voiceless obstruents so ''abdanken'' 'to resign' is pronounced . That is in contrast with the Standard Northern pronunciation, which requires the lenis sounds to be devoiced in that position: . Southern standard accents (Southern German, Austrian, Swiss) generally realize the lenis sounds as voiceless in most or all positions and do not feature syllable-final fortition: .

References

Bibliography

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Buhnendeutsch German phonology ja:ドイツ語音韻論#舞台発音