Dialect

A dialect is a way that people speak or write a language that is special to their group. It might be the main way a language is used, or it could be a simpler, everyday way people talk, especially in places far away or still growing. Dialects of the same language can sound different because of changes in sounds, word shapes, sentence building, and the words people use.

Languages with a writing system often have versions that are not the main written form. These spoken ways of talking can be shown in writing in special styles too.Dialects help us understand the rich variety of how humans communicate.

Standard and nonstandard dialects

A standard dialect is a version of a language that is supported by institutions like governments and schools. It is often taught as the "correct" way to speak and write. For example, the French language is supported by the Académie Française. This type of dialect usually has many books, poems, and other writings using it.

A nonstandard dialect also has its own rules and words, but it does not usually get the same support from institutions. The difference between a standard and a nonstandard dialect is often not clear and can depend on social or historical reasons. Sometimes, people argue about what should be called a language and what should be called a dialect.

Dialect as linguistic variety of a language

A dialect is a special way of speaking that is common in a certain area, sometimes called a regiolect, but it can also be linked to social class, called a sociolect, or to a group's ethnicity, called an ethnolect.

Any form of a language can be called a dialect, including the standard version used in writing and speaking. The line between a "standard language" and "nonstandard" dialects is often unclear and depends on social, political, or cultural reasons. Sometimes, the word "dialect" is used for versions of a language that are not the main or standard form, especially in everyday talk or in languages other than English. Some experts have used the term "dialect" for older, purer forms of a language, even when that is not always correct. For example, early experts did not think of Brummie (spoken in Birmingham) or Scouse (spoken in Liverpool) as real dialects because they developed recently and were influenced by Irish migrants.

Main article: A language is a dialect with an army and navy

There is no clear way to tell if two different ways of speaking are two languages or two dialects of the same language. Some ways to tell them apart exist, but they can give different answers. The difference between a dialect and a language is often a matter of opinion and depends on how you look at it. For example, people have argued about whether Limón Creole English, spoken on the Caribbean coast of Costa Rica by descendants of Jamaican people, is a kind of English or a different language. This depends on which university you ask in Costa Rica. Another example is Scanian, which for a time even had its own special code.

Main article: Linguistic distance

One important way to tell dialects apart is by looking at how different they are from each other, called linguistic distance. For two ways of speaking to be dialects of the same language, they need to be quite similar. If two languages are very different in how they are built, they have a high linguistic distance. But if they are very similar, they might be called dialects or closely related versions of the same language. Linguistic distance helps us see how languages are related, called language families. For example, Dutch and German are closely related and are part of the West-Germanic language group. French and Spanish are also related but are part of the Romance Branch of the Indo-European group, and they are closer to each other than to West-Germanic languages. When languages are close in linguistic distance, they look alike, so dialects are not very different from the language they come from.

One common way to tell if two ways of speaking are dialects of the same language is if someone who speaks one can understand and be understood by someone who speaks the other. But this idea has been questioned, especially when there is a dialect continuum, where each version is easy to understand with the next one, but far-away versions might not be easy to understand.

Some experts say that understanding each other can happen in different ways, and it can be hard to tell the difference between understanding and just being familiar with the other way of speaking. But new research shows there is some proof that using the understanding idea can help tell languages from dialects, even if it is not as simple as first thought. A group called SIL International, who make the Ethnologue and help with language codes, say a dialect cluster is a main version together with other versions that people can understand at a certain level (usually between 70% and 85% or more). If the level is high, the cluster is called a language.

Another way to tell dialects from languages looks at who has power over the language. Two ways of speaking are dialects of the same language if they both follow the same rules about the language. For example, speakers of Westphalian and East Franconian German might both look up new words in a German dictionary or ask a German expert. So these are called dependent on, or heteronomous with respect to, Standard German, which is autonomous.

But speakers in the Netherlands of Low Saxon versions similar to Westphalian would look up words in a Dutch dictionary, so it is called a dialect of Dutch. Even though Yiddish is a language in the High German group and can sometimes be understood by German speakers, a Yiddish speaker would use a Yiddish dictionary, so it is its own language.

Within this way of thinking, W. A. Stewart defined a language as an independent version plus all the versions that depend on it, noting that a similar idea was stated earlier by Charles A. Ferguson and John J. Gumperz in 1960. A version that depends on another can be called a dialect of that language. In these terms, Danish and Norwegian, though often understood by each other, are separate languages. In the thinking of Heinz Kloss, these are called languages by ausbau (development) rather than by abstand (separation).

Colloquial meaning of dialect

In everyday talk, the word "dialect" can have a special meaning. For example, in places like Italy, France, and the Philippines, calling a language a "dialect" can sometimes make it sound less important. This is because these languages are not the main, official language of the country, even though they may share old roots with it.

Even though these languages might seem different, they often have shared history and can sometimes be understood by speakers of the main language. When people use the word "dialect" this way, it often means they see the language as less important or not suitable for formal writing. Linguists might instead call these languages "vernacular languages."

Dialect and accent

John Lyons says that many language experts think changes in how people say words are part of what makes a dialect special. An accent is mainly about how words sound different, but a dialect can also include different ways of using grammar and different words.

Examples

Arabic

Main article: Arabic

German

Italy

Main articles: Languages of Italy and Regional Italian

Italy is often mentioned as a place where the word "dialect" is commonly used. Italy has many different languages, most of which are not easy to understand with each other and have their own local versions. Twelve of these (Albanian, Catalan, German, Greek, Slovene, Croatian, French, Franco-Provençal, Friulian, Ladin, Occitan and Sardinian) have been recognized as minority languages because of their history. However, many of the regional languages across Italy are often called Italian dialects, since they have used Tuscan as a base since the Middle Ages. But all these languages developed from Vulgar Latin at the same time as Italian, long before Italian spread widely.

During a important movement in Italy, Italian was mainly a written language, and only a small part of the population could speak it. Supporters of Italian unity stressed the need for one national language to help create a united Italy. With the unification of Italy in the 1860s, Italian became the official language, while the others were seen as dialects.

In the early 20th century, Italian men from all over Italy were brought together during World War I. This helped spread Italian among soldiers who had spoken different languages. With the spread of Italian through schools and media, Italians from all regions started to use Italian more. While the number of Italian speakers grew, regional languages changed. These changes, known as regional Italian, are versions of standard Italian influenced by local languages and accents.

The most widely spoken languages in Italy, which are not the same as regional Italian, belong to a group called the Italo-Dalmatian family. This includes:

the complex of the Tuscan and Central Italian dialects, such as Romanesco in Rome, with some varieties from Corsica (Gallurese and Sassarese) spoken in Northern Sardinia;
the Neapolitan group (also known as "Intermediate Meridional Italian"), which includes varieties from Naples and Campania like the Irpinian dialect, Abruzzese and Southern Marchegiano, Molisan, Northern Calabrian or Cosentino, and the Bari dialect. The Cilentan dialect of Salerno, in Campania, is influenced by Neapolitan and other groups;
the Sicilian group (also known as "Extreme Meridional Italian"), including Salentino and centro-southern Calabrian.

Modern Italian is based on the Florentine dialect of Tuscan. The Tuscan-based language became modern Italian through the works of writers like Dante Alighieri, Petrarch, and Giovanni Boccaccio. The importance of Tuscany during the Late Middle Ages and the Renaissance helped spread Florentine-Tuscan Italian.

Aside from the Italo-Dalmatian languages, the next most common group in Italy is the Gallo-Italic group, found across much of Northern Italy’s languages and dialects (such as Piedmontese, Emilian-Romagnol, Ligurian, Lombard, Venetian, Sicily's and Basilicata's Gallo-Italic in southern Italy, etc.).

Other languages in Italy come from different families: the Gallo-Romance languages (French, Occitan and its Vivaro-Alpine dialect, Franco-Provençal); the Rhaeto-Romance languages (Friulian and Ladin); the Ibero-Romance languages (Sardinia's Algherese); the Germanic Cimbrian, Southern Bavarian, Walser German and the Mòcheno language; the Albanian Arbëresh language; the Hellenic Griko language and Calabrian Greek; the Serbo-Croatian Slavomolisano dialect; and the various Slovene languages, including the Gail Valley dialect and Istrian dialect. The language indigenous to Sardinia, while Romance, is its own linguistic family, divided into Centro-Southern and Centro-Northern dialects.

Though mostly not easy to understand each other, the degree of difference between Italian languages changes based on how far apart they are or natural barriers between them. Some regional Italian languages that are close to each other or on the dialect continuum are more understandable. For example, a speaker of Eastern Lombard, a language in Northern Italy’s Lombardy region that includes the Bergamasque dialect, would find it hard to understand a purely Italian speaker and almost impossible to understand a Sicilian speaker. Because Eastern Lombard is a Gallo-Italic language, an Eastern Lombard speaker might understand an Occitan, Catalan, or French speaker better than an Italian or Sicilian speaker. Meanwhile, a Sicilian-speaking person would understand a speaker of the related Neapolitan language better, but much less with a person speaking Sicilian Gallo-Italic, a language from isolated Lombard communities on the same island as Sicilian.

Today, most Italians can speak Italian, though many still use their regional language regularly, especially at home with family or with people from the same town or area.

The Books of Genesis of the Ukrainian Nation by Mykola Kostomarov

The Balkans

The way speech versions are classified as dialects or languages and how they relate to others can be debated, and decisions can vary. Serbo-Croatian is a good example. Serbo-Croatian has two main formal types (Serbian and Croatian). Both are based on the Shtokavian dialect and can be understood by each other, with differences mostly in vocabulary and small grammar points. Some dialects in Serbia (Torlakian) and Croatia (Kajkavian and Chakavian) are not easy to understand, even though they are usually grouped under Serbo-Croatian. How these dialects should be seen compared to Shtokavian is still argued about.

Macedonian, which can mostly be understood with Bulgarian and some dialects of Serbo-Croatian (Torlakian), is seen by Bulgarian linguists as a Bulgarian dialect, while in North Macedonia, it is considered its own language. Before Macedonian became a standard literary language in 1944, most sources inside and outside Bulgaria before World War II called the South Slavic versions in today’s North Macedonia Bulgarian dialects. Sociolinguists say the question of whether Macedonian is a Bulgarian dialect or a language is political and cannot be solved just by language rules.

Lebanon

Malay

North Africa

Ukraine

The Modern Ukrainian language has been used since the late 1600s, starting with the Cossack Hetmanate. In the 1800s, the Russian Government said Ukrainian was just a version of Russian, not a real language. But in fact, Ukrainian and Russian developed separately for centuries and are quite different.

Moldova

There have been cases where a language was changed to serve political goals. One example is Moldovan. In 1996, the Moldovan Parliament rejected a proposal to rename the language to Romanian. In 2003, a dictionary was published claiming Moldovan and Romanian were different. Linguists in Romania said all Moldovan words were also Romanian. In Moldova, a scientist called the dictionary politically motivated. In 2023, Moldova’s president changed the official name of the language to Romanian in all laws and the constitution.

Greater China

Main article: Varieties of Chinese § Classification

The many versions of Chinese languages include thousands of dialects. In the north and southwest of China, these versions are quite similar, with about half understanding between Beijing and Sichuan. In the southeast, they are much more different. The main language groups in the south – Gan, Xiang, Wu, Min, Yue and Hakka – each have many versions that are hard to understand each other.

From the Ming dynasty onward, Beijing has been China’s capital, and the Beijing dialect of Mandarin has been most respected. With the founding of the Republic of China, Standard Mandarin, based on the Beijing dialect, became the country’s official language, replacing Classical Chinese. Other Chinese languages are called fangyan (regional speech). Cantonese, a Yue language, is most spoken in Guangzhou, Hong Kong, Macau and some overseas Chinese groups, while Shanghainese is main among the Wu languages.Hokkien, a Min language, is accepted in Taiwan as an important local language with Mandarin.

Chinese languages besides Classical Chinese and Standard Mandarin usually have no writing system. Some, like Cantonese, have a small literary tradition. Some use the Latin alphabet, with writings from British missionaries, and Dungan in Kazakhstan uses Cyrillic, but most use Chinese characters, which many share, making them look similar in writing. However, grammar words and much vocabulary differ. In the 1950s, China introduced simplified characters, used nationwide now. Traditional characters remain normal in Taiwan and some overseas groups.

Hindi

Main article: Hindi

Several dialects and languages are called Hindi dialects, which is a social idea rather than a language rule. Standard Hindi (and Standard Urdu) are based on Khari Boli, spoken around Delhi. Other dialects with good understanding spoken nearby include Haryanvi and languages from Western Uttar Pradesh, like Braj Bhasha. But many languages very different from Standard Hindi, without official status, are called Hindi dialects. This includes Bhojpuri, spoken in Eastern Uttar Pradesh and Bihar, which is really a different language. Over time, more languages have been seen as separate from Hindi and are no longer called Hindi dialects: Maithili became an official language of India in 2003, and Chhattisgarhi became official in Chhattisgarh.