phoneme

See also: Phoneme and phonème

EnglishEdit

EtymologyEdit

From Ancient Greek φώνημα (phṓnēma, “sound”), from φωνέω (phōnéō, “to sound”), from φωνή (phōnḗ, “sound”).

PronunciationEdit

(General American) IPA^(key): /ˈfoʊnim/
(Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ˈfəʊniːm/
Audio (US) (file)
Rhymes: -oʊnim, -əʊniːm

NounEdit

phoneme (plural phonemes)

An indivisible unit of sound in a given language. A phoneme is an abstraction of the physical speech sounds (phones) and may encompass several different phones.
Hypernym: syntagma
- 1990, Jarmo Lainio, “Sweden Finnish — development or deterioration?”, in Durk Gorter, editor, Fourth International Conference on Minority Languages: Western and Eastern European papers‎^[1], Multilingual Matters, →ISBN, page 31:
  It is crucial for the phoneme structure of Finnish — traditionally /d/ has not been included in the Finnish phonotax, but it fulfils the criteria of a phoneme (Karlsson, 1983: 66-7).

Derived termsEdit

Related termsEdit

TranslationsEdit

indivisible unit of sound

Albanian: fonemë (sq) f
Arabic: فُونِيم‎ m (fōnēm), صَوْت لُغَوِيّ‎ m (ṣawt luḡawiyy)
Armenian: հնչույթ (hy) (hnčʿuytʿ)
Asturian: fonema (ast) m
Belarusian: фане́ма f (fanjéma), фанэ́ма f (fanéma)
Breton: soniad
Bulgarian: фоне́ма (bg) f (fonéma)
Catalan: fonema (ca) m
Cebuano: ponema
Chinese:
Cantonese: 音素 (jam¹ sou³), 音位 (jam¹ wai^6-2)

Mandarin: 音素 (zh) (yīnsù), 音位 (zh) (yīnwèi)

Min Nan: 音素 (im-sò͘)
Czech: foném (cs) m
Danish: fonem (da) n
Dutch: foneem (nl) n
Esperanto: fonemo
Estonian: häälik, foneem
Finnish: foneemi (fi)
French: phonème (fr) m
Galician: fonema (gl) m
Georgian: ბგერა (bgera)
German: Phonem (de) n
Greek: φώνημα (el) n (fónima)
Gujarati: ધ્વનિઘટક (dhvanighṭak)
Hindi: ध्वनिग्राम m (dhvanigrām), ध्वनि (hi) f (dhvani), वाच् (hi) f (vāc), व्योम (hi) m (vyom)
Hungarian: fonéma (hu)
Icelandic: hljóðan (is)
Ido: fonemo (io)
Interlingua: phonema
Italian: fonema (it) m
Japanese: 音素 (ja) (おんそ, onso)
Kannada: ಧ್ವನಿಮಾ (kn) (dhvanimā)
Khmer: សទ្ទតា (km) (sattĕəʼtaa), សទ្ទភូត (sattĕəʼ phuut)
Korean: 음소(音素) (ko) (eumso), 표음(表音) (pyoeum), 낱소리 (natsori)
Kurdish:
Northern Kurdish: vac (ku)
Latin: phōnēma f
Latvian: fonēma f
Lithuanian: fonema (lt) f
Malay: fonem, warna bunyi
Manx: myn-heean
Marathi: ध्वनिघटक (dhvanighṭak)
Mongolian:
Cyrillic: авиалбар (mn) (avialbar), фонем (fonem)
Occitan: fonèma (oc) m
Persian: واج‎ (fa) (vâj)
Polish: fonem (pl) m
Portuguese: fonema (pt) m
Romanian: fonem (ro) n
Russian: фоне́ма (ru) f (fonéma)
Serbo-Croatian:
Cyrillic: фо̀не̄м m, фоне́ма f

Roman: fònēm (sh) m, fonéma f
Sicilian: funima m
Sindhi: وايوم‎ f (viome)
Slovak: fonéma f
Slovene: fonem (sl) m, glásnik m
Sorbian:
Lower Sorbian: fonem m

Upper Sorbian: fonem m
Spanish: fonema (es) m
Swahili: fonimu
Swedish: fonem (sv) n
Tagalog: multinig
Tamil: ஒலியன் (ta) (oliyaṉ)
Thai: หน่วยเสียง (nùai-sǐiang)
Tibetan: མ་སྒྲ (ma sgra)
Turkish: sesbirim (tr)
Ukrainian: фоне́ма f (fonéma)
Vietnamese: âm vị (音位)
Walloon: oyon (wa)
Yiddish: פֿאָנעם‎ m (fonem)

AnagramsEdit

phenome