读麦讲演在光速下生活（1974）003

　　The phonetic alphabet has a very peculiar set of characteristics which are not shared by any other alphabet on this planet. The phonetic alphabet, the one that you all call the ABCs, has a very peculiar structure. It is made up of phonemes, that is, bits that are meaningless. The twenty-six letters of our alphabet have no meaning at all. They’re called phonemes because in linguistic terms that means the smallest possible meaningless bit. ALL the other alphabets in the world, the Hebrew and the Arabic and the Hindu and the Chinese and so on, are morphemic. The bits they have are made of meaning, some meaning, however small.
　　语音字母表有非常独特的一套特征，不为这颗星球上任何其他符号系统所共有。这套语言字母表，你们都称之为ABC的这一套，具有一套非常特殊的结构。它是由音素即没有任何含义的小片段组成的。我们字母表中的26个字母根本没有含义。它们之所以被称为音素，是因为从语言学的角度来说，这是尽可能最小的无语义片段。世界上其他每一种符号系统，希伯来语、阿拉伯语、印度语和汉语等等，都是语素文字。它们所拥有的片段无论多么细小，都是由语义组成的，某种含义。
　　按： 拼音文字及其字母表的形成，是音素单位拼合而成的，总体上反映了从部落兼并到文化融合的过程中语音的流变。象形文字则是语素单位拼合而成的，单个字符都可能反映了兼并融合过程中语义的流变。
　　音素单位、语素单位及其组合、流变，都依赖视觉，不是望文生音，就是望文生义。麦克卢汉为了突出读写-视觉文化与听觉文化的差异而特化语音文字，几近肆辩。