English dictionary · adj

phonetic

Relating to the sounds of spoken language.

Meaning and definitions

1. Relating to the sounds of spoken language.
2. Relating to phones (as opposed to phonemes).
3. Relating to the spoken rather than written form of a word or name, as opposed to orthographic.

Connected roots

• phon-

  sound, voice

Explore the word family

These words share a recorded root connection. A shared root is a learning clue; it does not establish every step in a word’s history.

• telephone

  a device that transmits speech over distances by converting sound to signals

• microphone

  an instrument for converting sound waves into electrical energy

• saxophone

  A single-reed instrument musical instrument of the woodwind family, usually made of brass and with a distinctive loop bringing the bell upwards.

• megaphone

  a cone-shaped device for amplifying and directing the voice

• phonograph

  A device that captures sound waves onto an engraved archive; a lathe.

• phonology

  The study of the way sounds function in languages, including accent, intonation, phonemes, stress, and syllable structure, and which sounds are distinctive units within a language; (countable) the way sounds function within a given language; a phonological system.

• hydrophone

  a transducer that converts underwater sound waves into electrical signals, rather like a microphone

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