Umlaut

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

[edit] Linguistics

In linguistics, the term umlaut is used in a variety of closely related ways, some narrower, some broader. These are discussed in several different articles.

• Germanic umlaut - in its original, narrowest sense, umlaut is the fronting of vowels in a Germanic language caused by assimilation to an original front vowel in the following syllable, especially viewed diachronically.
• I-mutation - used more broadly, the term umlaut is sometimes used to refer to the same phenomenon in any language, including non-Germanic languages. A less controversial term is "i-mutation".
  • Affection (linguistics) - an example of this in another language family is the parallel phenomenon in Celtic languages, usually referred to as "affection".
• Vowel harmony and metaphony - more broadly still, some writers use the word umlaut to refer to any example of metaphony, or "regressive vowel harmony".
  • A-mutation - an example of this is a-mutation, the velarisation of vowels caused by an original back vowel in a following syllable, which is occasionally referred to as a-umlaut.
• Apophony - viewed synchronically, umlaut is an example of apophony or vowel alternation, although the use of the term as a synonym for apophony is erroneous.
  • Indo-European ablaut - in particular, the confusion of umlaut with ablaut is common and erroneous.

[edit] Orthography

• Umlaut (diacritic). In orthography, the term umlaut is sometimes used as a shortening of "umlaut mark", a diacritic similar to the diaeresis mark (a pair of dots above a vowel, as <ä> in "doppelgänger"), used in German spelling to represent the synchronic results of Germanic phonological Umlaut, and subsequently in other languages which borrowed the symbol.
  • Heavy metal umlaut - the umlaut diacritic has been used for sensational spellings in the rock music scene.