Colloquialism - Distinction From Dialect

Distinction From Dialect

The term dialect has two distinct meanings in linguistics. The first usage refers to a variation of a language that is characteristic of a particular group who speak the language. The term is applied most often to regional speech patterns, but a dialect may also be defined by other factors, such as social class. A dialect that is associated with a particular social class can be termed a "sociolect" and a regional dialect may be termed a "regiolect" or "topolect". The second usage refers to a language socially subordinate to a regional or national standard language, often historically cognate to the standard but not a variation of it or in any other sense derived from it. A dialect is distinguished by its vocabulary, grammar, and pronunciation.

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Famous quotes containing the words distinction and/or dialect:

    There is a distinction to be drawn between true collectors and accumulators. Collectors are discriminating; accumulators act at random. The Collyer brothers, who died among the tons of newspapers and trash with which they filled every cubic foot of their house so that they could scarcely move, were a classic example of accumulators, but there are many of us whose houses are filled with all manner of things that we “can’t bear to throw away.”
    Russell Lynes (1910–1991)

    The eyes of men converse as much as their tongues, with the advantage that the ocular dialect needs no dictionary, but is understood all the world over.
    Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)