phonogram (linguistics)

{{Short description|Grapheme}}

File:Chinese_phonogram_examples.png

A phonogram is a grapheme i.e. one or more written characters which represent a phoneme (speech sound),{{cite journal | last=Stötzner | first=Andreas | title=Signography as a Subject in its Own Right | journal=Visual Communication | volume=2 | issue=3 | date=2003 | issn=1470-3572 | doi=10.1177/14703572030023003 | pages=285–302}} rather than a bigger linguistic unit such as morphemes or words.{{cite book |last1=Coulmas |first1=Florian |title=The Blackwell encyclopedia of writing systems |date=1999 |publisher=Blackwell |location=Malden, Mass. |isbn=9780631194460}} For example, "igh" is an English-language phonogram that represents the {{IPAc-en|aɪ}} sound in "high". Whereas the word phonemes refers to the sounds, the word phonogram refers to the letter(s) that represent that sound.

Phonograms contrast with logograms, which represent words and morphemes (meaningful units of language), and determinatives, silent characters used to mark semantic categories.

A writing system that consists of phonograms shows phonography and can be called phonographic.

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