1. changing a vowel sound in a word due to the influence of a vowel in a following syllable, especially in Germanic languages
Usage: linguistics

Examples

• The German plural ‘Männer’ shows umlauting of the vowel ‘a’ to ‘ä’.
• Students learning German must understand how umlauting affects noun plurals.
• The process of umlauting created many irregular plural forms in Old English.
• Umlauting explains why ‘foot’ becomes ‘feet’ in English.
• The linguist was umlauting the vowels to demonstrate historical sound changes.