Editing Logogram (section)

== Semantic and phonetic dimensions ==
{{Further|Determinative}}

All historical logographic systems include a phonetic dimension, as it is impractical to have a separate basic character for every word or morpheme in a language.{{efn|Most have glyphs with predominantly syllabic values, called ''logosyllabic'', though Egyptian had predominantly consonantal or poly-consonantal values, and is thus called ''logoconsonantal''.}} In some cases, such as cuneiform as it was used for Akkadian, the vast majority of glyphs are used for their sound values rather than logographically. Many logographic systems also have a semantic/ideographic component (see [[ideogram]]), called "determinatives" in the case of Egyptian and "radicals" in the case of Chinese.{{efn|"Determinative" is the more generic term, however, and some authors use it for Chinese as well (e.g. William Boltz, in Daniels and Bright, 1996, p. 194).}}

Typical Egyptian usage was to augment a logogram, which may potentially represent several words with different pronunciations, with a determinate to narrow down the meaning, and a phonetic component to specify the pronunciation. In the case of Chinese, the vast majority of characters are a fixed combination of a radical that indicates its nominal category, plus a phonetic to give an idea of the pronunciation. The Mayan system used logograms with phonetic complements like the Egyptian, while lacking ideographic components.