Grapheme

Grapheme is the smallest unit of a writing system of any given language. An individual grapheme may or may not carry meaning by itself, and may or may not correspond to a single phoneme of the spoken language.

Definition

A grapheme is a fundamental unit in written language. Graphemes include alphabet letters, typographic ligatures, Chinese characters, numerical digits, punctuation marks, and other individual symbols of writing systems.

Types of Graphemes

There are different types of graphemes, including:

• Allographs: These are different representations of the same grapheme. For example, in English, the print and cursive letters "a" and "A" are considered different allographs of the same grapheme.

• Phonemes: These are the smallest unit of sound that can distinguish one word from another in a particular language.

• Morphemes: These are the smallest meaningful units of language. A morpheme can be a word, or a part of a word, like a prefix or suffix.

Grapheme-Color Synesthesia

Grapheme-color synesthesia is a form of synesthesia in which an individual's perception of numerals and letters is associated with the experience of colors. For example, a synesthete might perceive the number "2" as red.

See Also

• Phoneme
• Morpheme
• Allograph
• Grapheme-color synesthesia

References

Grapheme Resources
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