phonograph

Pronunciation

• IPA: /ˈfəʊnəˌɡɹɑːf/ (UK); /ˈfoʊnəˌɡɹæf/ (US)^[1]

Etymology

Formed in English from phono- “sound” and -graph “writing; recording instrument”,^[2][3][4] from Greek phōnḗ “sound, voice” and gráphein “to write”.^[5][2]

Earliest recorded meaning

A written character representing a speech sound (1835–40), a sense now obsolete.^[6][2][3][5]

Semantic evolution

The earliest machine to be called a phonograph picked up sound vibrations with a membrane and traced them on a cylinder, and the name passed to Thomas Edison's talking machine of 1877.^[5][6][2][3] In Britain the word is now used only for early cylinder machines, while in North America it became the usual word for a record player, corresponding to British gramophone.^[3][6] Gramophone is in fact an inversion of phonogram.^[5]

Timeline

• 1835–40 – a character representing a sound.^[6][2][3]
• 1877 – Edison's talking machine.^[6][2][3][7]
• 1884 – figuratively, one who repeats another's words.^[6]

Modern meaning

Noun

1. A machine that reproduces sound by means of a stylus following a spiral groove on a revolving disc or cylinder; a record player.

Word family

• phonographic
• phonographically

Related words

• gramophone
• phonetic
• telephone
• graph

References

1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f Barnhart, Robert K., ed. (1995), The Barnhart Concise Dictionary of Etymology, New York: HarperCollins
3. ^ a b c d e f Harper, Douglas, Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
4. ^ Random House Webster's Unabridged Dictionary (1999), 2nd ed., New York: Random House
5. ^ a b c d The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (1992), 3rd ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin
6. ^ a b c d e f Simpson, J. A.; Weiner, E. S. C., eds. (1989), The Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
7. ^ Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary (2003), 11th ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster