Grapheme

This article needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. Find sources: "Grapheme" – news · newspapers · books · scholar · JSTOR (April 2020) (Learn how and when to remove this message)

Part of a series on
Reading
Learning to read Reading readiness Vocabulary development Vocabulary learning
Scientific theories and models Dual route theory Simple view of reading Science of reading Scarborough's Reading Rope The active view of reading model
Cognitive processes Comprehension Phonemic awareness Phonological awareness Subvocalization Word recognition
Reading instruction Analytic phonics Basal reader Concept-oriented Directed listening and thinking activity Guided reading Independent reading Literature circle Phonics Reciprocal teaching Structured word inquiry Sustained silent reading Synthetic phonics Whole language
Reading rate Fluency Slow reading Speed reading Words per minute
Readability Automatic assessment Legibility Readability test
Reading differences and disabilities Dyslexia Hyperlexia Reading disability Reading for special needs
Language Alphabetic principle Braille Dolch word list Grapheme History of printing Language Morpheme Orthography Phoneme Sight word Vocabulary Written language Writing Writing system
Literacy Literacy rate Critical reading Close reading Distant reading Family literacy Functional illiteracy Great books Literary criticism Literature Children's
v t e

In linguistics, a grapheme is the smallest functional unit of a writing system.^[1] The word grapheme is derived from Ancient Greek gráphō ('write'), and the suffix -eme by analogy with phoneme and other emic units. The study of graphemes is called graphemics. The concept of graphemes is abstract and similar to the notion in computing of a character. By comparison, a specific shape that represents any particular grapheme in a given typeface is called a glyph.