Häagen-Dazs

Question

Which is the name for the two points put over the first a in  Häagen-Dazs, dieresis or umlaut?

Mister Micawber · Accepted Answer

I know that both are used rather cavalierly, but as I understand it, umlaut is the vowel change itself and dieresis is the written diacritical mark used to indicate the vowel change... except in German, where they are synonymous. Is Haagen-Dasz German ice cream?

Marius Hancu · Answer

I think it's dieresis, because it shows you really have two "a"s (or a long "a," separated into two syllabes) in this case, not a different sound as in German.
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di·aer·e·sis
Variant(s): also di·er·e·sis

2 : the mark placed over a vowel (as over the second of two adjacent vowels) to indicate that the vowel is pronounced in a separate syllable (as in naïve, Boëthius, Brontë)

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Also, this is an American brand, you don't have the umlaut really in AmE.

Teo · Answer

Contrary to common belief, the name is not Scandinavian; it is simply two made-up words meant to look Scandinavian to American eyes (which is quite ironic as "z" is rarely used in the Scandinavian languages). This is known in the marketing industry as foreign branding (and also similar to the heavy metal umlaut). Mattus included an outline of Denmark on early labels to reinforce the Scandinavian theme — ironically, although Häagen-Dazs operates in 54 countries around the world, none of the company's 700 stores are in any Scandinavian country.

The playful spelling devices in the name invoke the spelling systems used in several European countries. "ä" (an 'a' with an umlaut) is used in the spelling of the German, Finnish, Slovak and Swedish languages, doubled vowel letters spell long vowels in Finnish, Dutch, and occasionally German; and zs corresponds to /?/ (as in vision) in Hungarian. None of these spelling conventions is used in pronouncing the name of the American product, which has a short a, hard g, and a final s sound. The closest real name to the fake Häagen is Hagen (Danish/Norwegian/German surname, German first name, and German town name). Dazs could be a possible word in Hungarian due to the "zs" grapheme, but does not have any meaning and sounds unfamiliar even to be a name.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haagen-Dazs

Anonymous · Answer

The fact that Wikipedia says it's umlaut doesn't mean it is so in this case.

Cool Breeze · Answer

TeoContrary to common belief, the name is not Scandinavian; it is simply two made-up words meant to look Scandinavian to American eyes (which is quite ironic as "z" is rarely used in the Scandinavian languages). This is known in the marketing industry as foreign branding (and also similar to the heavy metal umlaut). Mattus included an outline of Denmark on early labels to reinforce the Scandinavian theme — ironically, although Häagen-Dazs operates in 54 countries around the world, none of the company's 700 stores are in any Scandinavian country.

Does Häagen-Dazs really look Scandinavian to Americans? I see nothing Scandinavian about it!

CB

CalifJim · Answer

Does Häagen-Dazs really look Scandinavian to Americans?

Sort of. Pseudo-Scandinavian, at least.

CJ

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