A phoneme is the smallest unit of sound that can make a difference in meaning in a language. However, there are several synonyms for phoneme that are used interchangeably in linguistics, such as sound segment, speech sound, and phonological segment. These terms are used to describe the various units of sounds in a language that are meaningful to distinguish different words in a given language. Other synonyms for phoneme include phonetic element, phonogram, syllabic constituent, and unit sound, all of which refer to the fundamental building blocks of spoken language. While these terms may differ slightly in meaning and usage, they all describe the same basic concept of the smallest unit of sound in a language.