Back Dieresi AN فاكة Arabic Diéresis AST Трэма Byelorussian Трэма BE-X-OLD Daouboent Breton Dièresi Catalan Trema Czech Didolnod Welsh Diäresezeichen German

Diaeresis (diacritic)

This article is about the use of two dots mark to denote the separation of two consecutive vowels. For other uses of the same mark, see Two dots (diacritic).
◌̈
Diaeresis
  • U+0308 ◌̈ COMBINING DIAERESIS

Diaeresis[a] (/daɪˈɛrəsɪs, -ˈɪər-/ dy-ERR-ə-siss, -⁠EER-)[1] is a name for the two dots diacritical mark (◌̈) as used to indicate the separation of two distinct vowel letters in adjacent syllables when an instance of diaeresis (or hiatus) occurs, so as to distinguish from a digraph or diphthong.

It consists of a two dots diacritic placed over a letter, generally a vowel; when that letter is an ⟨i⟩, the diacritic replaces the tittle: ⟨ï⟩.[2]

The diaeresis diacritic indicates that two adjoining letters that would normally form a digraph and be pronounced as one sound, are instead to be read as separate vowels in two syllables. For example, in the spelling "coöperate", the diaeresis reminds the reader that the word has four syllables co-op-er-ate, not three, *coop-er-ate. In British English this usage has been considered obsolete for many years, and in US English, although it persisted for longer, it is now considered archaic as well.[3] Nevertheless, it is still used by the US magazine The New Yorker.[4] In English language texts it is perhaps most familiar in the loan words naïve, Noël and Chloë, and is also used officially in the name of the island Teän and of Coös County. Languages such as Dutch, Afrikaans, Catalan, French, Galician, and Spanish make regular use of the diaeresis.


Cite error: There are <ref group=lower-alpha> tags or {{efn}} templates on this page, but the references will not show without a {{reflist|group=lower-alpha}} template or {{notelist}} template (see the help page).

  1. ^ Wells, J C (2000). Longman Pronunciation Dictionary (2nd ed.). Harlow, Essex: Pearson Education Limited. p. 219. ISBN 978-0-582-36467-7.
  2. ^ The Unicode Standard v 5.0. San Francisco: Addison-Wesley. 2006. p. 228. ISBN 0-321-48091-0.
  3. ^ Shaw, Harry (1993). "Accent Marks: Dieresis". Punctuate It Right! (second ed.). p. 38. ISBN 0-06-461045-4. ...it is much less used than formerly, having been largely replaced by the hyphen...
  4. ^ Cite error: The named reference curse was invoked but never defined (see the help page).

Developed by StudentB