Dialect: A Variety of a Language, and Where the Line Is Drawn
A dialect is a regional or social variety of a language, with its own words, grammar and pronunciation. The difference between a dialect and a language is political as much as linguistic.
A dialect is a variety of a language distinguished by vocabulary, grammar and pronunciation. Linguists have no reliable test to separate a dialect from a language, which produced the old joke that a language is a dialect with an army and a navy.
- A regional variety of a language. *The dialects of northern England.*
- A social variety. *A working-class urban dialect.*
- A version of a programming language. *A dialect of Lisp.*
Word forms
| Form | Word | Example |
|---|---|---|
| Noun | dialect | A rural dialect. |
| Adjective | dialectal | Dialectal variation. |
| Noun | dialectology | A study in dialectology. |
| Related | accent | A strong accent. |
| Related | idiolect | A speaker's idiolect. |
How it is used in a sentence
- The novel is written partly in dialect.Representing speech rather than standard written form.
- Dialect words for a bread roll vary wildly across England.Bap, cob, barm, roll and several more.
- Every dialect has a complete grammar of its own.The core finding of modern linguistics.
Dialect, accent and language
- Accent — pronunciation only
- Dialect — pronunciation, vocabulary and grammar together
- Language — a variety with recognised independent status
- Idiolect — the speech of a single individual
- Standard variety — the dialect that acquired institutional prestige, not a superior form
From Greek *dialektos*, discourse or way of speaking, from *dialegesthai*, to converse. Linguistics is firm on one point: no dialect is more logical or more correct than another, and the standard form is simply the one that won.
Is a dialect worse than a language?
No. The distinction reflects political and social status, not linguistic complexity. Every dialect has a full grammar.
Dialect or accent?
An accent is only how you pronounce words. A dialect also has different words and different grammatical patterns.