suprasegmental

English

Etymology

Etymology tree

Proto-Indo-European *úp

Proto-Indo-European *-er

Proto-Indo-European *upér

Proto-Italic *super

Proto-Italic *superos

Proto-Italic *superād

Old Latin suprād

Latin suprā

Latin supra-lbor.

English supra-

English segment

Proto-Indo-European *h₂el-der.?

Proto-Italic *-ālis

Latin -ālisbor.

Old French -albor.

▲

Latin -ālis

Old French -elbor.

▲

Latin -ālisbor.

Middle English -al

English -al

English segmental

English suprasegmental

From supra- + segmental.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˌsuːp.ɹə.sɛɡˈmɛn.təl/

• Audio (Southern England):

  (file)

Noun

suprasegmental (plural suprasegmentals)

1. (phonetics) An effect on speech, such as length, stress, tone, and phonation type, that extends over more than one segment of sounds.

Adjective

suprasegmental (not comparable)

1. Of or relating to a suprasegmental.
   • 1984, John DeFrancis, The Chinese Language: Fact and Fantasy (nonfiction), University of Hawaii Press, page 42:

     There are two kinds of phonemes in Chinese: segmental phonemes, which may be thought of as sequential sounds, and suprasegmental phonemes or tones, which in a sense are added to the syllable as a whole.

2. More than a segment.

Derived terms

• suprasegmentally

Translations

relating to a suprasegmental

• Cebuano: suprasegmental
• Chinese:

  Mandarin: 超音段的 (chāoyīnduàn de)

• French: suprasegmental (fr)
• German: suprasegmental
• Indonesian: suprasegmental (id)
• Serbo-Croatian: suprasegmentalan
• Spanish: suprasegmental

Cebuano

Etymology

From English suprasegmental.

Noun

suprasegmental

1. (phonetics) a suprasegmental

Adjective

suprasegmental

1. of or relating to a suprasegmental

Spanish

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /supɾaseɡmenˈtal/ [su.pɾa.seɣ̞.mẽn̪ˈt̪al]
• Rhymes: -al
• Syllabification: su‧pra‧seg‧men‧tal

Adjective

suprasegmental m or f (masculine and feminine plural suprasegmentales)

1. suprasegmental

Further reading

• “suprasegmental”, in Diccionario de la lengua española [Dictionary of the Spanish Language] (in Spanish), online version 23.8.1, Royal Spanish Academy [Spanish: Real Academia Española], 15 December 2025