Phoneme

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In linguistics and specifically phonology, a phoneme (/ˈfoʊniːm/) is any set of similar phones (speech sounds) that, within a given language, is perceptually regarded as a single distinct sound and helps distinguish one word from another.^[1]

For example, in dialects of English, the sound patterns /sɪn/ (sin) and /sɪŋ/ (sing) are two separate words that are entirely distinguished by the substitution of one phoneme, /n/, for another phoneme, /ŋ/.^[a] Two words like this that differ in meaning through the contrast of a single phoneme form a minimal pair. If, in another language, any two sequences differing only by pronunciation of the final sounds [n] or [ŋ] are perceived as being the same in meaning, then these two sounds are interpreted in that language as phonetic variants of a single phoneme, which linguists call allophones. For example, the sound sequences [pan] and [paŋ] are interpreted in Spanish as the same word (pan: the Spanish word for bread) because in Spanish, unlike in English, [n] and [ŋ] are not separate phonemes but rather regional or dialect-specific allophones of the same phoneme. In the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA), linguists use slashes to transcribe phonemes but square brackets to transcribe more exact pronunciation details; they describe this basic distinction as phonemic versus phonetic. Thus, minimal pairs, such as tap vs tab, or pat vs bat, can be transcribed phonemically and are written between slashes (including /p/, /b/, etc.), while nuances of exactly how a speaker pronounces /p/ are phonetic and written between brackets, such as [p] (for the p in spit) versus [pʰ] (for the p in pit, which in English is an aspirated allophone of /p/: pronounced with an extra burst of air).

There are differing views as to exactly what phonemes are and how a given language should be analyzed in phonemic (or phonematic) terms. Generally, a phoneme is regarded as an abstraction of a set (or equivalence class) of spoken sound variations (phones) that are nevertheless perceived as a single unit, a single sound, by the ordinary native speakers of a given language. For example, in American English, the sound spelled with the symbol t is usually articulated with: a glottal stop [ʔ] (or a similar glottalized sound) in the word cat, an alveolar flap [ɾ] in dating, an alveolar plosive [t] in stick, and an aspirated alveolar plosive [tʰ] in tie; however, English speakers perceive or "hear" all of these sounds as merely being variants (allophones) of a single phoneme that is traditionally transcribed as /t/. Allophones each have technically different articulations, yet their differences do not create meaningful distinctions between words. Sometimes, allophonic variation is conditioned, in which case a certain phoneme is realized as a certain allophone in particular phonological environments, or it may otherwise be free, or may vary by exact dialect or even by speaker. Therefore, phonemes are often considered to constitute an abstract underlying representation for segments of words, while speech sounds make up the corresponding phonetic realization, or the surface form.

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