French pronunciation
The letter combinations ouil (at the end of a word) and ouill (almost anywhere*) have no English equivalent: they are pronounced like the oo in "boo" plus a "y" sound. The IPA spelling is [uj], and the Lawless phonetic spelling is [uy].
Do not pronounce this like the word oui: [wi]. It helps to look at the letter combination as ou + il, rather than as oui + l. (The sound [wij] is spelled UIL after a consonant.)
* ouill followed by i (as in the past participle bouilli or the infinitive bouillir) is pronounced [uj] but the y sound is transferred to the next syllable: [bu ji] and [bu jir].
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Par exemple… |
| le brouillard | fog | |
| le fenouil | fennel | |
| la grenouille | frog | |
| la trouille | fear | |
| bouillir | to boil | |
| chatouiller | to tickle | |
| débrouiller | to untangle |
Related lessons
- Letters: O | U | I | L
- French vowels
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