1. Plural of phonology; the systems of sounds and sound patterns in languages or dialects.
Usage: linguistics; academic
2. The study of how sounds function in particular languages and how they are organized into systems.
Usage: linguistics; academic

Examples

• The phonologies of English and Spanish differ significantly in their vowel inventories.
• Linguists compare the phonologies of related languages to understand their historical development.
• Understanding different phonologies helps language learners recognize sound patterns in new languages.
• The phonologies of tonal languages like Mandarin Chinese are more complex than those of English.
• Researchers studied how the phonologies of immigrant communities change over generations.
• The course covered phonologies from languages across Africa, Asia, and Europe.