phonologic system
- noun
- /fəˈnɑlədʒɪk ˈsɪstəm/
- Specialized
:
sistema fonológico
- Every language has a unique phonologic system that distinguishes its words and meanings.
Examples
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A child's ability to learn the phonologic system of their native language develops over time.
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The English phonologic system has many vowel sounds.
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Linguists study the phonologic system to understand how sounds function in communication.
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Understanding the phonologic system of Mandarin is challenging.
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Every language has a unique phonologic system that distinguishes its words and meanings.
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A child's ability to learn the phonologic system of their native language develops over time.
-
Linguists study the phonologic system to understand how sounds function in communication.
Synonyms
A set of speech sounds and rules for using them in a language
The way small spoken parts are arranged to make words
A set of sounds used to tell words apart in a language
Surface Forms
Morphology
The phrase is directly compositional: 'phonologic' means relating to speech sounds and 'system' means a set of interacting components, so the combined meaning ('the system of sounds in a language') is predictable from the parts. This adjective+noun pattern is cross-linguistically common (e.g., Spanish 'sistema fonológico'), and even if 'phonologic' is less frequent than 'phonological', a learner who knows both constituents will readily infer the MWE meaning.
Etymology
The phrase phonologic system comes from parts that mean 'sound' and 'a group of parts'. Phonologic relates to 'sound' and system means parts that work together, so the phrase describes the set of sounds a language uses.
