Doutorando em Lingüística/ UFRJ. Trabalho realizado com o apoio do CNPq-Brasil. Endereço profissional: Museu Nacional/UFRJ. Depto. de Antropologia. Setor de Lingüística. Quinta da Boa Vista, s/n – São Cristóvão, Rio de Janeiro, RJ, Cep 20940-040.
Many teachers of German as a second language make some statements regarding this language that mix concepts from three distinct fields: Orthography (letters), Phonetics (phones or speech sounds) and Phonology (phonemes). In this paper I attempt to shed some light on these concepts and fields. I also provide examples of such statements and make comments on them.
