Dialect

A dialect (from low Latin of Greek / of / "talk together" ^Typology

The term dialect is initially referring to geographical variations of language (also known as rgiolecte and golecte ), an area studied by the dialectology. These dialects can coexist on the same plane (in the case of the United States : each region speaks English a little different, no variant is supposed to be preferable to others), or be subject to a standard language (that is the case in France for Languages d'oil compared to the French standard)

The concept was later extended to that of social dialects (or sociolects ) language varieties associated with a specific communicative context, particularly studied by sociolinguistics.

Difference between language and dialect

Some linguists believe that the distinction between dialect and language is not relevant from a linguistic point of view. For others, the difference can be justified by historical factors varied :

• Politics: a language is a dialect having obtained an official status.
• Social: a language is a dialect having obtained a social and cultural prestige . A particular language may be different from a dialect in use by a large literature and are called common "language of culture" or "literary language" .
• Population: a language is a dialect spoken by a vast number of people .
• Linguistics: the distinction between language and dialect is based on the possibility of mutual understanding. The speakers of different dialects are mutually comprising speak dialects of the same language. Speakers who do not understand speak different languages or dialects of different languages. This view is criticized because it is relative.

The claim for an idiom of the language status or, conversely, its continued status dialect often has a political connotation.

References

See also

• Patois
• Oral Literature
• Linguistic secessionism

• Language portal