letras

Letras is a term used in Spanish and Portuguese with several related meanings. Primarily, it refers to the letters or characters of a writing system—the symbols that alphabets use to encode speech. These letras, including uppercase and lowercase forms and diacritics, allow people to read, write, and reproduce language. The set of letras in a language is its alphabet or script, and orthography governs their use in spelling and punctuation.

Writing systems vary across languages and regions. The Latin alphabet is the most widespread, but other scripts such as Cyrillic, Arabic, Devanagari, and Chinese characters organize letters and signs differently. The history of letras traces the evolution of writing from pictographs and syllabaries to alphabets, with milestones like Phoenician, Greek, and Latin scripts. Typographic design focuses on how letras are presented in print and digital media, while literacy studies examine how people learn to recognize and use them.

In music, letras also means lyrics—the words of a song. Lyric texts are separate from musical notation and are central to a song’s meaning, performance, and copyright. In education, Letras or similar terms denote humanities degree programs focusing on language, literature, and culture in many Spanish- and Portuguese-speaking countries.

Overall, letras connect language, writing systems, literacy, and culture, spanning both the mechanics of script and the artistic expression found in song lyrics.