trigraph

[/ˈtraɪɡræf/]
nounmasculinepl: trigraphs
trígraffo
1. A group of three letters representing a single sound or phoneme in a language
In English, 'sch' in 'school' is a trigraph representing the /ʃ/ sound.
Em português, 'lh' em 'trabalho' é um trígraffo que representa um som específico.
2. In cryptography and computing, a sequence of three characters used for encoding or data representation
The HTML trigraph '<' represents the less-than symbol in web documents.
O trígraffo '<' em HTML representa o símbolo de menor que em documentos web.
The term 'trigraph' is primarily used in linguistic, educational, and technical contexts in both Brazil and the United States. It is particularly important in English language teaching as a foreign language, since English has numerous trigraphs (e.g., 'tch', 'igh', 'sch'). In Portuguese, while trigraphs exist (like 'lh', 'nh'), they are less commonly discussed in formal grammar compared to digraphs.
Synonyms / Sinônimos
three-letter combinationletter clustercharacter sequence
Antonyms / Antônimos
monographdigraph

Regional Variations

General Brazilian
trígraffo
Standard term used in linguistics and grammar education
Portugal
trígraffo
Same terminology used in European Portuguese linguistic contexts
Technical/Computing
trígraffo
Used in programming and HTML/Unicode contexts in both countries

Related Words

digraphphonemegraphemeorthographyligaturediacritic
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