different between dialect vs macrolanguage

English

Etymology

From Middle French dialecte, from Latin dialectos, dialectus, from Ancient Greek ????????? (diálektos, “conversation, the language of a country or a place or a nation, the local idiom which derives from a dominant language”), from ?????????? (dialégomai, “I participate in a dialogue”), from ??? (diá, “inter, through”) + ???? (lég?, “I speak”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /?da?.??l?kt/

Noun

dialect (plural dialects)

1. (linguistics) A variety of a language that is characteristic of a particular area, community, or social group, differing from other varieties of the same language in relatively minor ways as regards grammar, phonology, and lexicon.

   Hyponyms: sociolect, ethnolect, regiolect, geolect
2. (derogatory) Language that is perceived as substandard or wrong.
3. (colloquial) A language existing only in an oral or non-standardized form, especially a language spoken in a developing country or an isolated region.

   Synonym: vernacular

4. (colloquial) A lect (often a regional or minority language) as part of a group or family of languages, especially if they are viewed as a single language, or if contrasted with a standardized idiom that is considered the 'true' form of the language (for example, Cantonese as contrasted with Mandarin Chinese, or Bavarian as contrasted with Standard German).

   Synonyms: vernacular, (often derogatory) patois

5. (computing, programming) A variant of a non-standardized programming language.

6. (ornithology) A variant form of the vocalizations of a bird species restricted to a certain area or population.

Usage notes

• In some linguistic traditions, the term "dialect" is restricted to nonstandard lects. In scholarly English usage, it refers to both standardized and vernacular forms of language.
• The difference between a language and a dialect is not always clear, and often has more to do with political boundaries than with linguistic differences. It is generally considered that people who speak different dialects of the same language can understand each other, while people who speak different languages cannot, however, in some cases, people who speak different dialects of the same language are mutually unintelligible. Compare species in the biological sense.

Derived terms

Related terms

Translations

Meronyms

• idiolect

See also

• dialogue

References

Further reading

• "dialect" in Raymond Williams, Keywords (revised), 1983, Fontana Press, page 105.
• Crystal, David (2008) , “dialect”, in A Dictionary of Linguistics and Phonetics, 6 edition, Blackwell Publishing, ?ISBN
• Fodde Melis, Luisanna; (2002) Race, Ethnicity and Dialects: Language Policy and Ethnic Minorities in the United States, FrancoAngeli, ?ISBN

Anagrams

• citadel, dactile, deltaic, edictal, lactide

Dutch

Etymology

From Middle French dialecte, from Latin dialectos, dialectus, from Ancient Greek ????????? (diálektos, “conversation, the language of a country or a place or a nation, the local idiom which derives from a dominant language”), from ?????????? (dialégomai, “I participate in a dialogue”), from ??? (diá, “inter, through”) + ???? (lég?, “I speak”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /?dija??l?kt/
• Hyphenation: di?a?lect
• Rhymes: -?kt

Noun

dialect n (plural dialecten, diminutive dialectje n)

1. (linguistics) dialect (language variety)
2. non-standard dialect; vernacular

   Synonyms: streektaal, mondaard

Derived terms

• dialectgroep

Descendants

• Afrikaans: dialek
• ? Indonesian: dialek

Anagrams

• citadel

Romanian

Etymology

From French dialecte.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /di.a?lekt/

Noun

dialect n (plural dialecte)

1. (linguistics) language socially subordinate to a regional or national standard language, often historically cognate to the standard, but not a variety of it or in any other sense derived from it
2. (colloquial) dialect

Declension

Derived terms

• subdialect

See also

• idiom, grai, limbaj, limb?

English

Pronunciation

Etymology 1

macro +? language

Noun

macrolanguage (plural macrolanguages)

1. (computing) Alternative spelling of macro language (“system for defining and processing macros”)
   • 2006, G. Brent Hall and Michael G. Leahy, "Internet-Based Spacial Decision Support Using Open Source Tools", Chapter XIII of Shivanand Balram and Suzana Dragi?evi?, Collaborative Geographic Information Systems, Idea Group Inc., ?ISBN, page 238:

     Much of the emphasis in spatial decision-support research continues to focus on developing tools, typically using macrolanguage scripting exclusively or scripting linked to compilable programming and commercial geographic information system software, such as workstation Arc/Info and desktop ArcGIS.

Usage notes

• This is more commonly written as two words: macro language.

Etymology 2

From macro- +? language.

Noun

macrolanguage (plural macrolanguages)

1. (linguistics) A language consisting of widely varying dialects.
   • 1993, in La Trobe working papers in linguistics, volumes 6-8,^[1] page 161:

     A linguist working with the criterion of mutual intelligibility would recognize six languages in central and western Victoria, most of them covering large areas. These widespread languages would not have been recognized as languages by the speakers themselves and they have no native name. The largest macrolanguage covers most of western Victoria north of Ballarat and Hamilton.

   • 1996, Bertil Tikkanen, "Languages of interethnic communication on the Indian Subcontinent (excluding Nepal)", in Stephen Adolphe Wurm et al. (editors), Atlas of Languages of Intercultural Communication in the Pacific, Asia, and the Americas, Volume II.1, Walter de Gruyter, ?ISBN, page 787:

     The Indo-Aryan languages or macrolanguages of the plains merge into each other, being on the local level made up of enormous dialect continua (e.g. PANJABI-HINDI-BIHARI-RAJASTHANI-PAHARI). ¶ These fluid ‘macrolanguages’ (indicated by capital letters, e.g. HINDI) may have “dialects” which are mutually unintelligible and hard to classify.

   • 2007, Jose A. Fadul (general editor), Encyclopedia Rizaliana: Student Edition, Lulu.com, ?ISBN, page 6:

     Modern Arabic is classified as a macrolanguage with 27 sub-languages spoken throughout the Arab world.

   • 2014, Xiao Lan Curdt-Christiansen, Andy Hancock, Learning Chinese in Diasporic Communities: Many pathways to being Chinese, John Benjamins Publishing Company (?ISBN), page 100:

     For this reason, the Ethnologue (2009) recognizes Chinese in their list of languages of China not as a language, but as a macrolanguage, i.e. multiple, closely related individual languages that are deemed in some usage contexts to be a […]

2. (linguistics) A group of mutually intelligible speech varieties that are sometimes considered distinct languages.

Further reading

• ISO 639 macrolanguage on Wikipedia.Wikipedia