phonogram

American  

[foh-nuh-gram] / ˈfoʊ nəˌgræm /

noun

1. Linguistics. a symbol that represents a speech sound, syllable, or other sequence of speech sounds without reference to meaning, such as a letter in the Latin alphabet.

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phonogram British  

/ ˈfəʊnəˌɡræm /

noun

1. any written symbol standing for a sound, syllable, morpheme, or word

2. a sequence of written symbols having the same sound in a variety of different words, for example, ough in bought, ought, and brought

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Other Word Forms

• phonogramic adjective
• phonogramically adverb
• phonogrammic adjective
• phonogrammically adverb

Etymology

Origin of phonogram

First recorded in 1855–60; phono- + -gram ¹

Example Sentences

The musical accompaniment is provided by a recorded phonogram synthesizer.

From Seattle Times • Sep. 14, 2021

Some ten years after the late Thomas Alva Edison first recorded the human voice* on tinfoil in 1877, he sent the foregoing jingly "phonogram," on a wax cylinder, to Colonel George E. Gouraud in London.

From Time Magazine Archive

In 1888 Edison sent his first phonogram by steamer to England.

From The Boyhood of Great Inventors by Robertson, A. Fraser

Here is the phonogram it made, and here in England we can listen to its wailing, for the phonograph reproduces every kind of sound, high or low, whistling, coughing, sneezing, or groaning.

From Heroes of the Telegraph by Munro, John

Like Ampere, too, he was noted for a memory which retained many of the facts thus impressed upon it, as the sounds are printed on a phonogram.

From Heroes of the Telegraph by Munro, John