1. a mark added to a letter to indicate a specific pronunciation
Usage: linguistics

1. serving to distinguish or mark a difference
Usage: formal; linguistics

Examples

• The acute accent is a common diacritic in French.
• Spanish uses the tilde as a diacritic over the letter n.
• Without diacritics, some words would be impossible to pronounce correctly.
• The diacritic marks help distinguish between similar-looking words.
• Many languages rely on diacritical marks for proper spelling.
• The cedilla is a diacritic that appears under the letter c in some languages.