UMLAUT (DISAMBIGUATION)

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The word 'umlaut' is used in both linguistic and typographic senses.

Contents

Linguistics

Diachronic use

Synchronic Use

Orthography

See also

Linguistics

In linguistics, the term 'umlaut' is used in a variety of closely related ways, some narrower, some broader:

Diachronic use

★ Germanic umlaut — in its original diachronic sense, the historic fronting of vowels in Germanic languages, caused by assimilation to an original front vowel in the following syllable. That is, an instance of diachronic regressive vowel harmony.

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★ I-mutation — historic vowel fronting in any language (sometimes also called ''umlaut'').

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★ Affection (linguistics) — historic vowel fronting in Celtic languages.

★ Apophony - viewed synchronically, the results of the Germanic umlaut sound change are now examples of grammatical vowel alternations, known as variously as ''apophony'', ''ablaut'', ''vowel gradation'', etc.

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★ Indo-European ablaut - in Indo-European contexts, ''umlaut'' (phonologically conditioned historic vowel fronting) is contrasted with ''ablaut'' (a more ancient reconstructed grammatical vowel alternation in PIE of uncertain origin).

Synchronic Use

★ ''Regressive'' (or ''anticipatory'') vowel harmony.

Orthography

★ Umlaut (diacritic). In orthography, the term 'umlaut' is sometimes used as a shortening of "umlaut mark", a diacritic used in German spelling to represent the synchronic results of Germanic phonological Umlaut, and subsequently in other languages which borrowed the symbol. The symbol appears as a pair of dots above a vowel, such as <ä> in "Doppelgänger". It has the same appearance as a diaeresis mark, as in the <ö> of "coöperate".

★ Heavy metal umlaut - the umlaut diacritic has been used for sensational spellings in the rock music scene.

See also

★ A-mutation — another type of historic vowel harmony (velarisation of vowels caused by an original back vowel in a following syllable), sometimes called ''a-umlaut''.