What Is a Phoneme?

Language is the means by which we communicate through words with structure and meaning. Starting at an early age, we become increasingly aware of how words join with other words to form larger units such as phrases, clauses, and sentences, which can then together make paragraphs.

In an opposite way, words also can be divided into morphemes, which are the smallest grammatical units that establish a word or a meaningful part of a word; they cannot be further separated. Every word in English includes at least one morpheme.

Equally important to language are the sounds that form our words when we speak them. Similar to morphemes as minimal units, phonemes are the smallest units of speech sounds that distinguish words through pronunciation and give them particular meanings.

For example, the words “chain” and “train” each contain three phonemes (smallest units of sound):

chain: ch, ai, n

train: tr, ai, n

The sounds we make with chain and train differentiate the two words in our speech. Because of the meanings we relate to the sounds in each word— especially the starting ones—we understand a chain and a train are not the same thing.

Similarly, consider how ending phonemes differentiate the following words:

tab, tad, tag

start, stark, stars

beam, beat, beak

By these examples alone, we can see how phoneme originated from phṓnēma, the Greek word for “sound.”

Phonemes: How Many Are There?

English includes forty-four phonemes comprising consonants, digraphs, r-controlled sounds, long vowels, short vowels, oo sounds, and diphthongs.

By comparison, a language such as Hawaiian spoken on the islands has eight consonant phonemes and between five and twenty-five vowel phonemes, depending on how many sounds are being counted. This creates a total of between thirteen and thirty-three total phonemes.

When English phonemes are being identified, their written representations are placed in slashes: e.g., /i/ /b/ /d/ /s/ /ie/ /th/.

Phonemes: Variance of Pronunciation

Understanding phonemes in our language becomes important when we recognize how different letters can produce different sounds.

For example, consider how we pronounce the “t” in “wet” and then “water.” “Wet” has a more-defined “t” while the “t” in “water” has more of a “d” sound. This sound-changing phenomenon in American English is known as tapping.

A reference called the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) provides a useful tool for transcribing sounds of languages spoken throughout the world.

In the chart, each IPA symbol represents a certain sound as opposed to a letter. This is important because many languages use the same letters for different sounds or different letters for the same sound.

Using the IPA, linguists can transcribe global speech sounds in support of clear communication and further study across the vast range of languages.

Phonemes: Independent from Letters and Spelling

Phonemes’ difference from letters and spelling becomes apparent when we consider words such as certain and sample; knock, nice, and gnat; and curtain and kick. Dissimilar spellings and letters produce similar sounds.

The distinction is likewise evident in words such as say, trait, weight, crate, as well as in booth, truth, and uncouth.

A related concept applies to homophones, two or more words that sound the same but have different meanings and often different spellings: e.g., blue, blew; for, four, fore.

A word also can have the same number of letters as it does phonemic sounds: e.g., “cat,” in which c, a, and t are all separate phonemes.

Note too how phonemic sounds influence the difference between a sentence such as “She is writing.” (statement) and “She is writing?” (question). In the question, we assign rising phonemic intonations to the word writing to convey to our listener that we are asking one.

We also use phonemic variance to distinguish words such as the verb record (ri-kawrd) and the noun record (rek-erd).

Geography plays a big part in phonemic development as well. Here in America we’re familiar with the influence of phonemes on regional dialects in which the same word in the same country is pronounced differently. The same holds true for phonemes in the languages of other countries.

Phonemes’ Importance to Lifelong Learning

When we are young and first discovering how to communicate, we begin by recognizing and repeating phonemes: We hear and form sounds before we do words.

Through our brain’s great plasticity, we become able to join and articulate phonemes in meaningful ways with other people. This in turn also furthers our capacity to develop increasing reading skills.

Research indicates that phonemes contribute to brain plasticity during adulthood as well. This is especially true when we learn other languages, which introduce us to even more language sounds and phonemic connections, proving that mental and intellectual growth can continue for a lifetime.

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