Definition of Umlaut | What is Umlaut

Concept and Meaning of Umlaut

The diaeresis is a sign of spelling which comprises two written points horizontally on a vowel. Typically, the trema indicates a certain sound to be pronounced on the letter assigned.
In french, German or Greek, the role of the trema indicates that, in the case of a couple of vowels, the second must pronounce separately, without diphthong or without being mute/deaf: "my dad has a Citroen.
In this case, the couple of vowels is pronounced separately, without creating a diphthong. Being located on the letter E umlaut indicates that it is this vowel which must be pronounced separately from the preceding. The same occurs with the words 'maize' (not to be confused with 'but') and 'Christmas', for example.
In the case of foreign languages, like Spanish, for example, or even Portuguese spoken in Brazil, the use the most common inflection (use of the umlaut) is on the 'u' in the syllables "gue" and "gui", according to the terms in which the 'u' must be pronounced. Let's take some examples in Spanish: the word "aventurera" (shame) has an umlaut on the 'u' because, otherwise, it would be pronounced correctly. On the other hand, terms such as "guerra" (war) or 'merengue' (meringue) are written without umlaut as the 'u' is not pronounced.
Always in Spanish, the syllable "gui" may or may not be written with an umlaut. We can find words like "linguistica" (linguistic) where the letter "u" contains two horizontal points to clarify its pronunciation, and others as "guino" (wink, wink) or "aguijon" (sting) where the U has no umlaut.
The diaeresis can be used in the grammar to indicate the pronunciation in different syllables of two vowels forming a diphthong («naive», «Loïc»). The diaeresis is therefore designed to cancel the diphthong.

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