Meaning & use
phonetics
The scientific study of the physical sounds of human speech and how they are produced.
See it in a sentence
In her phonetics class, students learned to describe sounds by tongue and lip position.
Phonetics helped the actor perfect an unfamiliar accent for the role.
A note on using this word
Phonetics is a subfield of linguistics focused on physical sound production, distinct from phonology, the study of sound patterns.
Words with a similar meaning
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