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Dialect vs Isolect - What's the difference?

dialect | isolect |

In linguistics terms the difference between dialect and isolect

is that dialect is a variety of a language (specifically, often a spoken variety) that is characteristic of a particular area, community or group, often with relatively minor differences in vocabulary, style, spelling and pronunciation while isolect is a language or dialect; coined as a neutral term between ‘language’ and ‘dialect.’

dialect

English

(wikipedia dialect)

Noun

(en noun)
  • (linguistics) A variety of a language (specifically, often a spoken variety) that is characteristic of a particular area, community or group, often with relatively minor differences in vocabulary, style, spelling and pronunciation.
  • * A language is a dialect with an army and a navy.
  • *
    • And in addition, many dialects of English make no morphological distinction between Adjectives and Adverbs, and thus use Adjectives in contexts where the standard language requires -ly'' Adverbs: compare
    (81) (a)      Tex talks ''really quickly'' [Adverb + Adverb]
            (b)   %Tex talks ''real quick     [Adjective + Adjective]
  • A dialect of a language perceived as substandard and wrong.
  • * 1967 , Roger W. Shuy, Discovering American dialects , National Council of Teachers of English, page 1:
    • Many even deny it and say something like this: "No, we don't speak a dialect around here. [...]
  • * 1975 , Linguistic perspectives on black English , H. Carl, page 219:
    • Well, those children don't speak dialect , not in this school. Maybe in the public schools, but not here.
  • * 1994 , H. Nigel Thomas, Spirits in the dark , Heinemann, page 11:
    • [...] on the second day, Miss Anderson gave the school a lecture on why it was wrong to speak dialect'. She had ended by saying "Respectable people don't speak ' dialect ."
  • A language.
  • A variant of a non-standardized programming language.
    • Home computers in the 1980s had many incompatible dialects of BASIC.

    Usage notes

    * The difference between a language and a dialect is not always clear, but it is generally considered that people who speak different dialects can understand each other, while people who speak different languages cannot. Compare species in the biological sense.

    Derived terms

    * dialectal * dialectic

    Related terms

    * dialectally * dialectical * dialectician * dialectics

    See also

    * dialogue * ethnolect * idiolect * sociolect

    Anagrams

    * ----

    isolect

    English

    Noun

    (en noun)
  • (linguistics) A language or dialect; coined as a neutral term between ‘language’ and ‘dialect.’
  • * 1967', Alfred B. Hudson, ''The Barito '''Isolects of Borneo: a Classification Based on Comparative Reconstruction and Lexicostatistics , page 53,
    • Dohoi is distinctive among all the Barito isolects .
  • * 2003 , Ralph W. Fasold, The Sociolinguistics Of Language , page 200,
    • At the same time, the ordering of isolects that is finally chosen must give the right results for (virtually) all the environments.
  • * 2008 , Keith Brown, Sarah Ogilvie, Malay'', entry in ''Concise Encyclopedia of Languages of the World , page 677,
    • While Middle Malay, Minangkabau, and Kerinci have inland and west coast variants as their origin, Malay itself developed from isolects spoken on the east coast.

    Related terms

    * lect