The most common and most likely answer to this crossword clue is the 7 letter word PHONEME
I've seen this crossword clue in The Guardian
P
H
O
N
E
M
E
More clues leading to the result PHONEME
- Page with note about Polish sound
- Call me sound linguistically
- Distinctive sound coming from pub, I note
- Perhaps mobile, with its case, producing little sound
- Part of speech in which I ask you to call
- I want to hear from you in the linguistics unit
- Call the compiler from sound unit
- Language unit — I await your call?
- Ring this person found in sound unit
- Give us a call, as basis of communication?
Buddy explains!
The straight part
We know that "Language unit" is the straight/definition part of the clue. The straight part is often a synonym or definition, in this case language unit = phoneme.The cryptic/wordplay part
In cryptic crossword there's often an wordplay/cryptic part as well.This part involves a more complex hint, such as an anagram, homophone, hidden word, etc.
Sadly, We don't have an explanation for this specific crossword clue yet.
What does PHONEME mean?
PHONEME noun- An indivisible unit of sound in a given language. A phoneme is an abstraction of the physical speech sounds (phones) and may encompass several different phones.