ablaut
Systematic vowel change
Ablaut is the systematic vowel change in related words that signals grammatical distinctions—most visibly in English strong verbs: sing, sang, sung; drive, drove, driven; ring, rang, rung.
The pattern is inherited from ancient Indo-European and distinguishes these verbs from weak verbs that form past tenses with -ed.
Ablaut also appears in word families like song/sing and food/feed.
Sequential interchange of elements
- morphologyStudy of structural forms
- Indo-EuropeanVast language family
- morphemeSmallest meaningful language unit
- paradigmGoverning framework of thought
Minimal distinctive sound unit
- stressPressure, mental or vocal
- accentRegional speech pattern
- syllableUnit of pronunciation
- sonorityRichness of tone
articulation · height · diphthong · monophthong · schwa · phonological rule · prosody
Germanic consonant shift principle
- reconstructionRebuilding after destruction
- diachronicConcerning change over time
- cognateWord sharing etymological origin
- proto-languageReconstructed common ancestor tongue
Sanskrit · Germanic · Greek · Latin · language family · philology · root
alternation
Sequential interchange of elements
- morphologyStudy of structural forms
- Indo-EuropeanVast language family
- morphemeSmallest meaningful language unit
paradigm · derivational · grade · reduplication · inflectional
phoneme
Minimal distinctive sound unit
sonority · articulation · height · diphthong · monophthong · schwa · phonological rule · prosody
Grimm's Law
Germanic consonant shift principle
- reconstructionRebuilding after destruction
- diachronicConcerning change over time
- cognateWord sharing etymological origin
proto-language · Sanskrit · Germanic · Greek · Latin · language family · philology · root
mouse-mice
Small mammal, irregular plural
- irregular verbsVerbs with unpredictable tenses
ablautaffixation
Binding morphemes to stems
suffixation · prefixation · agglutination · reduplication · compounding
ablautumlaut
Double-dot diacritical mark
consonant gradation · zero derivation · conversion · invariance