Here’s a language question for you to ponder, the next time you’re waiting for enough bars to make a call: Have you ever, at any time, referred to your cell phone as a “telephone”?

I don’t think I ever have. In fact, it would actually sound weird to me if someone were to do so… When they’re not using brand names, everyone says “cell phone”, “phone”, or even just plain “cell”. (Consider that one for a minute – how odd is it that a word that once meant “the smallest structural and functional unit of an organism” or “a small room for locking up prisoners” can now be used for making calls?) Other terms like “smartphone” and “mobile phone” also show up regularly, but not “telephone”.

Image by Jmak on Wikimedia Commons under CC BY-SA 3.0.

Admittedly, “telephone” was fading out in favor of “phone” long before we could put them in our pockets, but now its meaning seems to have narrowed as well: The image in my head is entirely different when my mom ends a story with “Then the telephone rang.” than when my friend says “Then my phone rang.” It’s partly the definite article vs. the possessive pronoun, of course, but I think the words themselves have also come to be distinct in my mind. A “phone” can be either, but a “telephone” is a landline, not a cell phone, at least to me. The word hasn’t made the transition to the new technology.

That’s ironic, given how the physical form of earlier telephones continues to influence our speech: We still say a phone “rings”, even when it plays a clip from a popular song; we still “dial” a number, even when we’re tapping buttons on a flat, rectangular screen; and we still “hang up” on those annoying unsolicited calls —despite the fact that many younger callers have never heard or seen a rotary phone with a hook for the handset. “Cordless” may have given way to “wireless” in our daily lives, but a few terms still linger.

What started this train of thought was an ad where someone had translated “Get the app on your phone!” using the Spanish word teléfono, and I caught myself wondering if that was right. Then I wondered why I was wondering, and realized just how long it had been since I’d said “telephone” in English, which in turn made me curious how other languages are handling this particular technological transition. A few quick Google image searches confirmed that teléfono mostly produces pictures of home phones, while móvil and celular bring up more portable devices. The same thing happens with searches for “telephone” and “phone” in English, by the way, so I’m not imagining this phenomenon.

It’s just more proof that language change is happening right under our noses – or in this case, right against our ears.

What about you – what do you call the handy, portable music-player/selfie-taker/Internet-access-device-that-also-happens-to-make-calls in your pocket? What do people call it in the language you are learning? And do you ever use the word “telephone” anymore?