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Definition: Phonograph |
PhonographNoun1. Machine in which rotating records cause a stylus to vibrate and the vibrations are amplified acoustically or electronically. Source: WordNet 1.7.1 Copyright © 2001 by Princeton University. All rights reserved. |
Date "phonograph" was first used: 1835. (references) |
Note: Phonograph \Pho"no*graph\, noun. [Phono- -graph.]. (Websters 1913) |
| Domain | Definitions |
Satire | PHONOGRAPH, n. An irritating toy that restores life to dead noises. Source: Devil's Dictionary. |
Electrical Engineering | An electroacoustic device including a record player, an amplifying system and one or more built-in or separate loudspeakers. Source: European Union. (references) |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
(From Wikipedia, the free Encyclopedia)
The phonograph, or gramophone, was the most common devices for playing recorded sound from the 1870s through the 1980s. Usage of these terms is somewhat different in British English and American English; see usage note below. In more modern usage, this device is often called the turntable or record player. In the late 19th and early 20th century, the alternative term talking machine was sometimes used. The phonograph was the first device for recording and replaying sound.
The term phonograph means "writing sound", a term coined from Greek roots. Similar related terms gramophone and graphophone mean the same thing. Arguably, any device used to record sound or reproduce recorded sound could be called a type of "phonograph", but in common practice it is usually only used to refer to certain historic technologies of sound recording.
Emile Berliner invented what he called the Gramophone, another device for recording and replaying sound, and patented it in 1888. It recorded on a disk using side-to-side (lateral) motion of the stylus.
In American English, "phonograph" was the most common generic term for any early sound reproducing machine.
Berliner's Gramophone was considered a type of phonograph.
"Gramophone" was a brand name, and as such in the same category as "Victrola," "Zon-o-phone," and "Graphonola" referring to specific brands of sound reproducing machines.
The brand "Gramophone" was not used in the USA after 1901, and the word fell out of use there.
In contemporary American usage "phonograph" most usually refers to disc record machines or turntables, the most common type of analogue recording from the 1910s on.
The "phonograph", or "gramophone", or "turntable" remained a common element of home audio systems well after the introduction of other media such as audio tape and even the early years of the compact disc.
They were not uncommon in home audio systems into the early 1990s.
Technics were largely responsible for the reinvention of turntables in the late 1960's when they created first direct drive turntable, the SP-10.
One continuing use of the phonograph turntable is "Scratching" in hip hop or rap music.
See also:
British and American language usage differences
In British English "gramophone" came to refer to any sound reproducing machine using disc records, as disc records were popularized in the UK by the Gramophone Company.
The term "phonograph" is usually restricted to devices playing cylinder recordsDiscs verses cylinders on the marketplace
Disc recording is inherently neither better nor worse than cylinder recording in potential audio fidelity.
However Berliner's disc technique had commercial advantages over the Edison cylinder system:
After years of experimentation, in 1895 Berliner decided he had perfected his "gramophone" system to begin commercial production of his disc records and "gramophones" or "talking-machines" to play them on.
These were the first analogue disc records to be offered to the public.
From mid the 1890s through the 1910s both phonograph cylinder and disc recordings and machines to play them on were widely mass marketed and sold.
The disc system gradually became more popular due to its cheaper price and better marketing by disc record companies.The dominance of the disc phonograph
Berliner's lateral disc record was the ancestor of the 78rpm, 45rpm, Long Play, and all other analogue disc records popular for use in sound recording through the 20th century.
For a more detailed discussion, see analogue disc recordThe phonograph in the 21st century
Phonographs or disc record turntables continue to be manufactured and sold into the 21st century, although in much smaller numbers.
Phonograph turntables at a radio station, 2003
External links:
Source: adapted by the editor from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia under a copyleft GNU Free Documentation License (GFDL) from the article "Phonograph."
Synonym: PhonographSynonym: record player (n). (additional references) |
| Domain | Usage | |
Screenplays | You know, you haven't stopped talking since I came here? You must have been vaccinated with a phonograph needle. (Duck Soup; writing credit: Bert Kalmar ; Harry Ruby) Why, you can get a phonograph record of Minnie the Moocher for 75 cents. (A Night at the Opera; writing credit: James Kevin McGuinness; George S. Kaufman) | |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | ||
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Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |||
| Thumbnail | Description & Credit | Thumbnail | Description & Credit |
 | Fire at Edison Site at night, Phonograph Works, Building #24;12/9/1914;{10.390/11}. |  | Phonograph Works;12/10/1914;{10.390/39}. |
 | Man, woman, and phonograph.Credit: Library of Congress. |  | Registration of a cornet solo by the phonograph [1889] / Poyet.Credit: Library of Congress. |
 | Miguelito making phonograph record.Credit: Library of Congress. |  | Farmer and wife examining phonograph at auction near Tenstrike, Minnesota.Credit: Library of Congress. |
 | Daughter of FSA (Farm Security Administration) rehabilitation borrower listening to phonograph. Crawford County, Illinois.Credit: Library of Congress. |  | Architectural Forum, at Studio Alliance. Living room, phonograph detail.Credit: Library of Congress. |
 | Pictures and mementoes on phonograph top: Yonemitsu home, Manzanar Relocation Center / photograph by Ansel Adams.Credit: Library of Congress. |  | President Harding's voice has been preserved in phonograph records in the government archives.Credit: Library of Congress. |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |||
| Title | Author | Quote |
Grapes of Wrath | Steinbeck, John | The other man puts a nickel in the phonograph, watches the disk slip free and the turntable rise up under it. |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references. | ||
| Subject | Topic | Quote |
Economic History | Israel | Israel adheres to the major multilateral IPR agreements, including the Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works, the Paris Convention for the Protection of Industrial Property, and the Geneva Phonograph Convention. (references) |
Political Economy | PERU | Peru signed the World Intellectual Property Organization's treaty on Copyrights in July 2001, but has yet to ratify the associated Phonograph and Performances Treaty. (references) |
Source: compiled by the editor from ICON Group International, Inc.; see credits. | ||
| Speaker | Phrase(s) |
Nellie Connally | I did for a while like a phonograph record. It just went off around again and again in my head if I was awake. Now, I have pushed it back, never to forget, but not to constantly upset me all the time. |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
| "Phonograph" is generally used as a noun (singular) -- approximately 92.86% of the time. "Phonograph" is used about 28 times out of a sample of 100 million words spoken or written in English. Its rank is based on over 700,000 words used in the English language. Some parts-of-speech are not covered due to the samples used by the British National Corpus. (note: percents less than one-hundredth of one percent have been omitted) |
| Parts of Speech | Percent | Usage per 100 Million Words | Rank in English |
| Noun (singular) | 92.86% | 26 | 68,323 |
| Noun (proper) | 7.14% | 2 | 245,945 |
| Total | 100.00% | 28 | N/A |
Source: compiled by the editor from several corpora; see credits.
Expressions using "phonograph": phonograph album ♦ phonograph needle ♦ phonograph record ♦ phonograph recording ♦ phonograph recording disk. Additional references. | |
| Hypenated Usage | |
Ending with "phonograph": radio-phonograph. | |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
| The following statistics estimate the number of searches per day across the major English-language search engines as identified by various trade publications. Hyperlinks lead to commercial use of the expression at Amazon.com. |
| Language | Translations for "phonograph"; alternative meanings/domain in parentheses. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Albanian | gramafon (gramophone, record player, turntable). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Arabic | فونوغراف (record player), حاكي, الحاكي الفونوغراف. (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Bulgarian | фонограф, грамофон (gramophone, record player). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Chinese | 電唱機 , 留声机 (gramophone). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Czech | gramofon (gramophone, record, record player), fonograf. (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Danish | pladespiller med forstærker og højttaler (gramophone). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Dutch | grammofoon (record-player). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Esperanto | gramofono (record-player). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Farsi | گرامافون (Gramophone), گرام , دستگاه ضبطصوت (Dictaphone, Recorder). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Finnish | levysoitin (record player). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
French | phonographe (cylinder phonograph). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Frisian | grammofoan (record-player). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
German | Tonaufzeichnungsgerät. (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Greek | γραμμόφωνο,φωνόγραφος (gramophone), φωνογράφοσ (dictaphone, victrola). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Hebrew | מקול (gramophone), פטיפון (gramophone, record player, turntable). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Hungarian | gramofon (gramophone), fonográf (phonographic). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Indonesian | gramopon, gramofone (gramophone). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Italian | fonografo (gramophone). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Japanese Kanji | フェルミ粒子 (a walk, fall, fault, fault-tolerance, fauvisme, fellowship, fence, fencing, fender, Fermi particle, ferret, ferro-alloy, foam, foam rubber, focus, Fodor, fog, fog lamp, fog light, foie gras, folder, folk, folk art, folk dance, folk song, folklore, follow, follow wind, follow-through, followup, follow-up, fondue, font, force, force-out, ford, fore, forecast, foreground, forehand, foreman, forge, fork, fork ball, forklift, forklore, form, formal, formal dress, formal wear, formalism, format, formation, formatter, formatting, form-feed, formula car, formula plan, formula translation, forte, FORTRAN, fortune, forum, forward, forward pass, forwarding, fossa magna, foster child, foster parent, four nines, fox-trot, Fuji, Fuji-TV, pheromone, phone, photo, photo library, photo realism, photo story, photo studio, photochromic glass, photocoupler, photodiode, photogenic, photogenie, photograph, photographer, photography, photogravure, photoresist, phototransistor, Volkswagen, VW). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Japanese Katakana | フォノグラフ . (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Korean | 축음기. (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Manx | greie loayrt. (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Norwegian | grammofon (cylinder phonograph, gramophone). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Papiamen | pikòp (record-player), tokadisko (record-player). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Pig Latin | onographphay gramofon (record-player). (various references) gramofone (cylinder phonograph, grampus, talking machine). (various references) fonograf. (various references) граммофон (gramophone, talking machine). (various references) fonograf (talking machine). (various references) fonógrafo. (various references) grammofon (gramophone, recordplayer). (various references) gramofon (gramophone, record-player). (various references) фонограф (talking machine), грамофон (gramophone, talking machine). (various references) kèn hát. (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Language | Period | Translations |
| Greek | 700 BCE-300 CE | phono-. (various references) |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references. | ||
Derivations | |
Words beginning with "phonograph": phonographer, phonographers, phonographic, phonographically, phonographies, phonographs, phonography. (additional references) | |
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"Phonograph" is suggested in spellcheckers for the following: phonograpg. (additional references) | |
| Source: compiled by the editor, based on several corpora (additional references). | |
| # of Phoneme Matches | Pronunciation | Word(s) rhyming with "phonograph" (pronounced fō"nugra'f) |
| 6 | -n u g r a' f | monograph. |
| 5 | -u g r a' f | autograph, choreograph, hectograph, lithograph, mimeograph, paragraph, photograph, spectrograph, Telegraph. |
| 4 | -g r a' f | polygraph. |
| 3 | -r a' f | riffraff. |
Source: compiled by the editor (additional references); see credits. | ||
Scrabble® Enable2K-Verified Anagrams | |
| Words within the letters "a-g-h-h-n-o-o-p-p-r" | |
-3 letters: harpoon. | |
-4 letters: gonoph, hoorah, orphan. | |
-5 letters: apron, argon, graph, groan, hogan, honor, horah, orang, organ, pargo, phono, porno, prang, prong. | |
| Words containing the letters "a-g-h-h-n-o-o-p-p-r" | |
+1 letter: phonographs, phonography. | |
+2 letters: phonographer, phonographic. | |
+3 letters: anthropophagi, anthropophagy, phonographers, phonographies, photographing. | |
+4 letters: anthropophagus. | |
+5 letters: anthropophagies, anthropophagous, nonphotographic, organophosphate, phosphorylating, rephotographing. | |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. SCRABBLE® is a registered trademark. All intellectual property rights in and to the game are owned in the U.S.A and Canada by Hasbro Inc., and throughout the rest of the world by J.W. Spear & Sons Limited of Maidenhead, Berkshire, England, a subsidiary of Mattel Inc. Mattel and Spear are not affiliated with Hasbro. | |
Hexadecimal (or equivalents, 770AD-1900s) (references)50 68 6F 6E 6F 67 72 61 70 68 |
| Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519; backwards) (references)
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| American Sign Language (origins from 1620-1817 in Italy and, especially, France) (references)
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| Semaphore (1791, in France) (references)
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| Braille (1829, in France) (references)
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Morse Code (1836) (references).--. .... --- -. --- --. .-. .- .--. .... |
| Dancing Men (Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, 1903) (references)
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| Amazon.com BOOKS: Search for: "phonograph" |
