logogramme

A logogram is a written symbol that represents a word or a morpheme rather than a single spoken syllable or phoneme. Logograms are central to logographic writing systems, where the primary aim of the symbol is lexical meaning rather than phonetic reconstruction.

In practice, many logograms convey semantic content and can be read with limited knowledge of pronunciation. Some logograms also carry phonetic cues or are used in phono-semantic compounds, where a symbol suggests meaning while a separate element provides sound. Thus, a logogram may function as a word or as part of a larger word, depending on the language and context.

Examples of logographic writing include Chinese characters (hanzi), which form the core of written Chinese and are also used in Japanese as kanji for much of the vocabulary. Other ancient systems with logograms include Egyptian hieroglyphs, Sumerian cuneiform in its early stages, and Mayan glyphs. Numerals such as 1, 2, and 3 are often cited as logograms because they convey specific numerical concepts without spelling out a word.

Historically, logographic writing emerged in different cultures as a way to record meanings directly, sometimes evolving to include phonetic elements. With the rise of alphabetic and syllabic systems, pure logographic writing became less common in many languages, though it remains dominant in East Asian scripts and continues to influence modern typography and information design.

Logography contrasts with alphabetic systems, which encode sounds, and syllabaries, which encode syllables. In practice, many scripts blend logographic, ideographic, and phonetic features to varying degrees.