More bunny than badass
March 8, 2016 8:29 AM   Subscribe

 
Cool, thanks. I once got my band mates to agree to name our cd "In the Müd".
posted by sneebler at 8:57 AM on March 8, 2016 [3 favorites]


Is this the place where I can say that the rock dots over the 'n' in 'Spın̈al Tap' do my mind in? I see them and know that I should pronounce the 'n' differently from usual, but what can you do with an 'n'? 'Bout the only thing my brain can do is act like it's some gnarly Iberian tilde and it comes out like /speen-yall tap-ay/. It's not pretty.

/Bonus umlaut-related link: This original K-tel ad for the Hūsker Dū board game.
posted by benito.strauss at 9:30 AM on March 8, 2016


Haha, I never understood the rock dots, because yes, umlaut is cute. Nice post
posted by mumimor at 9:47 AM on March 8, 2016


Ümmm...
posted by oneswellfoop at 9:50 AM on March 8, 2016


Thüs üs vöry informatüv. Thänk yuh.
posted by Namlit at 10:40 AM on March 8, 2016


Lövely!
posted by Splunge at 10:51 AM on March 8, 2016


Comment with umlauts over the vowels!
posted by beerperson at 10:58 AM on March 8, 2016 [1 favorite]


For many years - well, until the advent of Google Translate really - I was plagued* by thoughts that we only had the word of those sleazy hucksters at K-Tel that Hüsker Dü really was Danish for "do you remember?" This went on until, by high school, I had halfway convinced myself that the whole thing was some insane prank, and Hüsker Dü actually meant "please kick me in the balls," or something even worse.



*plagued may be too strong a word.
posted by Naberius at 11:25 AM on March 8, 2016 [1 favorite]


It's actually Lovelü
posted by Namlit at 11:28 AM on March 8, 2016


The first constructed language to gain any mass traction as an international auxiliary language was Volapük, which uses a lot of umlauts. Understanding a bit of the language actually helps the German umlaut make a lot more sense, because words like famül (family) show how the creator actually substituted umlaut sounds for the English equivalents that the video's description implies. The vocabulary in the simple course Volapük Vifik give a really good flavor for how English and German "naturally" relate to each other in the eyes of a 19th century priest and language reformer.
posted by graymouser at 11:51 AM on March 8, 2016 [1 favorite]


Fond memories of an Old Norse linguistics class in university. The prof had us follow all of the various sound changes from Proto-Norse to Old Norse (and then it wasn't hard to ride the momentum to modern Icelandic) and of course umlaut is one of those big sound changes for vowels.
I too can't help but parse Mötley Crüe as Muhtley Cru but Motörhead drives me bananas because it violates the whole concept of umlaut: the second vowel alters the first vowel, not the other way around.
posted by bluebelle at 3:57 PM on March 8, 2016


Aw; doesn't touch on why the umlaut looks the way it does. Lower-case E in many German scripts looked like two little vertical lines, a bit like ‘𝚤𝚤’ (as in the well-nigh illegible Sütterlinschrift). When you superscripted it to make the umlaut sign, you made the bunny ears: ë.

I still prefer the Hungarian “bunny in a strong wind” version: ő.

But the most mëtäl language of all has to be Albanian, where they put umlauts on (IIRC) unstressed vowels. It's umlauts a-go-go with those guys.
posted by scruss at 4:45 PM on March 8, 2016 [1 favorite]


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