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Grapheme
In linguistics, a grapheme is the smallest functional unit of a writing system. The word ''grapheme'' is derived and the suffix ''-eme'' by analogy with ''phoneme'' and other names of emic units. The study of graphemes is called '' graphemics''. The concept of graphemes is abstract and similar to the notion in computing of a character. By comparison, a specific shape that represents any particular grapheme in a given typeface is called a glyph. Conceptualization There are two main opposing grapheme concepts. In the so-called ''referential conception'', graphemes are interpreted as the smallest units of writing that correspond with sounds (more accurately phonemes). In this concept, the ''sh'' in the written English word ''shake'' would be a grapheme because it represents the phoneme /ʃ/. This referential concept is linked to the ''dependency hypothesis'' that claims that writing merely depicts speech. By contrast, the ''analogical concept'' defines graphemes analogou ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Allography
Allography, from the Greek for "other writing", has several meanings which all relate to how words and sounds are written down. Authorship An allograph may be the opposite of an autograph – i.e. a person's words or name (signature) written by someone else. Script In graphemics, the term ''allograph'' denotes any glyphs that are considered variants of a letter or other grapheme, like a number or punctuation. An obvious example in English (and many other writing systems) is the distinction between uppercase and lowercase letters. Allographs can vary greatly, without affecting the underlying identity of the grapheme. Even if the word "cat" is rendered as "cAt", it remains recognizable as the sequence of the three graphemes ‹c›, ‹a›, ‹t›.The Cambridge Encyclopedia of Language, second edition, Cambridge University Press, 1997, p. 196 Thus, if a group of individual glyphs (shapes that may or may not represent the same letter) are allographs (they do represent the same ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Writing System
A writing system is a method of visually representing verbal communication, based on a script and a set of rules regulating its use. While both writing and speech are useful in conveying messages, writing differs in also being a reliable form of information storage and transfer. Writing systems require shared understanding between writers and readers of the meaning behind the sets of characters that make up a script. Writing is usually recorded onto a durable medium, such as paper or electronic storage, although non-durable methods may also be used, such as writing on a computer display, on a blackboard, in sand, or by skywriting. Reading a text can be accomplished purely in the mind as an internal process, or expressed orally. Writing systems can be placed into broad categories such as alphabets, syllabaries, or logographies, although any particular system may have attributes of more than one category. In the alphabetic category, a standard set of letters represent ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Glyph
A glyph () is any kind of purposeful mark. In typography, a glyph is "the specific shape, design, or representation of a character". It is a particular graphical representation, in a particular typeface, of an element of written language. A grapheme, or part of a grapheme (such as a diacritic), or sometimes several graphemes in combination (a composed glyph) can be represented by a glyph. Glyphs, graphemes and characters In most languages written in any variety of the Latin alphabet except English, the use of diacritics to signify a sound mutation is common. For example, the grapheme requires two glyphs: the basic and the grave accent . In general, a diacritic is regarded as a glyph, even if it is contiguous with the rest of the character like a cedilla in French, Catalan or Portuguese, the ogonek in several languages, or the stroke on a Polish " Ł". Although these marks originally had no independent meaning, they have since acquired meaning in the field of mathemati ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Phoneme
In phonology and linguistics, a phoneme () is a unit of sound that can distinguish one word from another in a particular language. For example, in most dialects of English, with the notable exception of the West Midlands and the north-west of England, the sound patterns (''sin'') and (''sing'') are two separate words that are distinguished by the substitution of one phoneme, , for another phoneme, . 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 or are perceived as being the same in meaning, then these two sounds are interpreted as phonetic variants of a single phoneme in that language. Phonemes that are established by the use of minimal pairs, such as ''tap'' vs ''tab'' or ''pat'' vs ''bat'', are written between slashes: , . To show pronunciation, linguists use square brackets: (indicating an aspirated ''p'' i ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Emic Unit
In linguistics and related fields, an emic unit is a type of abstract object. cited in Kinds of emic units are generally denoted by terms with the suffix ''-eme'', such as ''phoneme'', ''grapheme'', and ''morpheme''. The term "emic unit" is defined by Nöth (1995) to mean "an invariant form obtained from the reduction of a class of variant forms to a limited number of abstract units". The variant forms are called etic units (from ''phonetic''). This means that a given emic unit is considered to be a single underlying object that may have a number of different observable "surface" representations. The various etic units that represent a given emic unit of a certain kind are denoted by a corresponding term with the prefix ''allo-'', such as ''allophone'', ''allograph'', and ''allomorph''. History and terminology The first emic unit to be considered, in the late 19th century, was the phoneme. The word ''phoneme'' comes from the el, φώνημα, , meaning "that which is sounded", ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Graphemics
Graphemics or graphematics is the linguistic study of writing systems and their basic components, i.e. graphemes. At the beginning of the development of this area of linguistics, Ignace Gelb coined the term '' grammatology'' for this discipline; later some scholars suggested calling it ''graphology'' to match ''phonology'', but that name is traditionally used for a pseudo-science. Others therefore suggested renaming the study of language-dependent pronunciation '' phonemics'' or '' phonematics'' instead, but this did not gain widespread acceptance either, so the terms ''graphemics'' and ''graphematics'' became more frequent. Graphemics examines the specifics of written texts in a certain language and their correspondence to the spoken language. One major task is the descriptive analysis of implicit regularities in written words and texts (''graphotactics'') to formulate explicit rules (''orthography'') for the writing system that can be used in prescriptive education or in com ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Character (computing)
In computer and machine-based telecommunications terminology, a character is a unit of information that roughly corresponds to a grapheme, grapheme-like unit, or symbol, such as in an alphabet or syllabary in the written form of a natural language. Examples of characters include letters, numerical digits, common punctuation marks (such as "." or "-"), and whitespace. The concept also includes control characters, which do not correspond to visible symbols but rather to instructions to format or process the text. Examples of control characters include carriage return and tab as well as other instructions to printers or other devices that display or otherwise process text. Characters are typically combined into strings. Historically, the term ''character'' was used to denote a specific number of contiguous bits. While a character is most commonly assumed to refer to 8 bits (one byte) today, other options like the 6-bit character code were once popular, and the 5-bit Baud ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Abstraction
Abstraction in its main sense is a conceptual process wherein general rules and concepts are derived from the usage and classification of specific examples, literal ("real" or " concrete") signifiers, first principles, or other methods. "An abstraction" is the outcome of this process—a concept that acts as a common noun for all subordinate concepts and connects any related concepts as a ''group'', ''field'', or ''category''.Suzanne K. Langer (1953), ''Feeling and Form: a theory of art developed from Philosophy in a New Key'' p. 90: " Sculptural form is a powerful abstraction from actual objects and the three-dimensional space which we construe ... through touch and sight." Conceptual abstractions may be formed by filtering the information content of a concept or an observable phenomenon, selecting only those aspects which are relevant for a particular purpose. For example, abstracting a leather soccer ball to the more general idea of a ball selects only the information on ge ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Square Bracket
A bracket is either of two tall fore- or back-facing punctuation marks commonly used to isolate a segment of text or data from its surroundings. Typically deployed in symmetric pairs, an individual bracket may be identified as a 'left' or 'right' bracket or, alternatively, an "opening bracket" or "closing bracket", respectively, depending on the directionality of the context. Specific forms of the mark include parentheses (also called "rounded brackets"), square brackets, curly brackets (also called 'braces'), and angle brackets (also called 'chevrons'), as well as various less common pairs of symbols. As well as signifying the overall class of punctuation, the word "bracket" is commonly used to refer to a specific form of bracket, which varies from region to region. In most English-speaking countries, an unqualified word "bracket" refers to the parenthesis (round bracket); in the United States, the square bracket. Various forms of brackets are used in mathematics, with s ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Angle Bracket
A bracket is either of two tall fore- or back-facing punctuation marks commonly used to isolate a segment of text or data from its surroundings. Typically deployed in symmetric pairs, an individual bracket may be identified as a 'left' or 'right' bracket or, alternatively, an "opening bracket" or "closing bracket", respectively, depending on the directionality of the context. Specific forms of the mark include parentheses (also called "rounded brackets"), square brackets, curly brackets (also called 'braces'), and angle brackets (also called 'chevrons'), as well as various less common pairs of symbols. As well as signifying the overall class of punctuation, the word "bracket" is commonly used to refer to a specific form of bracket, which varies from region to region. In most English-speaking countries, an unqualified word "bracket" refers to the parenthesis (round bracket); in the United States, the square bracket. Various forms of brackets are used in mathematics, with s ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Syllable
A syllable is a unit of organization for a sequence of speech sounds typically made up of a syllable nucleus (most often a vowel) with optional initial and final margins (typically, consonants). Syllables are often considered the phonological "building blocks" of words. They can influence the rhythm of a language, its prosody, its poetic metre and its stress patterns. Speech can usually be divided up into a whole number of syllables: for example, the word ''ignite'' is made of two syllables: ''ig'' and ''nite''. Syllabic writing began several hundred years before the first letters. The earliest recorded syllables are on tablets written around 2800 BC in the Sumerian city of Ur. This shift from pictograms to syllables has been called "the most important advance in the history of writing". A word that consists of a single syllable (like English ''dog'') is called a monosyllable (and is said to be ''monosyllabic''). Similar terms include disyllable (and ''disyllabic''; al ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
