the study of the sound system of a language or of languages in general
Comparesyntax 1 such a sound system
WordReference Random House Learner's Dictionary of American English © 2026
pho•nol•o•gy /fəˈnɑlədʒi, foʊ-/USA pronunciation
n. [uncountable]
pho•nol•o•gist /fəˈnɑlədʒɪst/USA pronunciation n. [countable]See -phon-, -log-.
WordReference Random House Unabridged Dictionary of American English © 2026- Phoneticsthe study of how sounds are patterned in a language and of the rules governing pronunciation.
pho•nol•o•gist /fəˈnɑlədʒɪst/USA pronunciation n. [countable]See -phon-, -log-.
pho•nol•o•gy
(fə nol′ə jē, fō-),USA pronunciation n., pl. -gies.
pho•no•log•i•cal
(fōn′l oj′i kəl),USA pronunciation pho′no•log′ic, adj.
pho′no•log′i•cal•ly, adv.
- Phoneticsthe study of the distribution and patterning of speech sounds in a language and of the tacit rules governing pronunciation.
- Phoneticsthe phonological system or the body of phonological facts of a language.
- 1790–1800; phono- + -logy
Collins Concise English Dictionary © HarperCollins Publishers::
'phonology' also found in these entries (note: many are not synonyms or translations):
Baudouin de Courtenay
- Ellis
- consonantism
- dental
- dialect
- generative phonology
- grammar
- internal reconstruction
- joual
- level
- liaison
- linguistics
- marked
- morpheme structure condition
- morphophonology
- phonetics
- phono
- phono-
- phonol.
- phonological rule
- phonologist
- pod
- structural linguistics
- systematic phoneme
- typology