# Difference between a dialect and a language



## Arrius

*Mod note:*
*This discussion started off the topic of another thread, and I thought it deserves its own place.*

*This post was a reply to this one:*


Lorixnt2 said:


> It's correct Arrius. It is even easier to understand the evolution of the word when you consider the original form stems from the venetian slang where it sounded like
> 
> _scia(v)o vostro _and, with progressive reductions, ---> _sciao _---> _ciao_
> 
> The original form _sciao _still exists in the venetian slang but, more than a declaration of slavery means something like "my turn next time".
> 
> For another example of reduction process it could be nice to compare the Spanish
> 
> Vuestra Merced ---> Usted
> 
> Ciao.


 
Yes, Lorixnet2, but rather than just "Venetian slang" isn't it from a distinct language ,Veneto, which is comparable to Provençal in linguistic status? Of course, when the word is used in more or less standard Italian as you say, it is indeed slang. It may be of further interest that the equivalents of slave and Slav in various European languages are not similar by conincidence, but because most slaves were once mainly ethnic Slavs.
Ciao A.


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## Lorixnt2

Arrius said:


> Yes, Lorixnet2, but rather than just "Venetian slang" isn't it from a distinct language ,Veneto, which is comparable to Provençal in linguistic status? Of course, when the word is used in more or less standard Italian as you say, it is indeed slang. It may be of further interest that the equivalents of slave and Slav in various European languages are not similar by conincidence, but because most slaves were once mainly ethnic Slavs.
> Ciao  A.




I find  possible to see it  that way Arrius. On a more general note I'd say every language undergoes constant variations but we admit it remains the same as long as we choose not to consider them as remarkable. Generally, instead, we tend to categorize using the "different" when we have  stated before an evolution leads to different parallel solutions. Cp e.g.  nowadays Italian and Dante Alighieri's that are quite different but are both called "Italian"   or the origin from the common latin stock of a Provençal (langue d'oc), a French (langue d'oil) and an Italian that have been considered separate languages. A slang, if you wanted to see it this way, is a language
lacking a language identification and personally I could only say I have the feeling to understand quite well both Veneto and French. At least I hope.
Ciao


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## I Am Herenow

Arrius said:


> Yes, Lorixnet2, but rather than just "Venetian slang" isn't it from a distinct language ,Veneto, which is comparable to Provençal in linguistic status? Of course, when the word is used in more or less standard Italian as you say, it is indeed slang. It may be of further interest that the equivalents of slave and Slav in various European languages are not similar by conincidence, but because most slaves were once mainly ethnic Slavs.
> Ciao A.


 


Lorixnt2 said:


> I find possible to see it that way Arrius. On a more general note I'd say every language undergoes constant variations but we admit it remains the same as long as we choose not to consider them as remarkable. Generally, instead, we tend to categorize using the "different" when we have stated before an evolution leads to different parallel solutions. Cp e.g. nowadays Italian and Dante Alighieri's that are quite different but are both called "Italian" or the origin from the common latin stock of a Provençal (langue d'oc), a French (langue d'oil) and an Italian that have been considered separate languages. A slang, if you wanted to see it this way, is a language
> lacking a language identification and personally I could only say I have the feeling to understand quite well both Veneto and French. At least I hope.
> Ciao


 

I don't understand, are you guys saying that stuff like Basque and Catalan aren't proper languages, or only stuff like South American Spanish/American English?


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## Lorixnt2

I Am Herenow said:


> Heh I was thinking of that when I read that "I'm your slave" thing
> 
> 
> I don't understand, are you guys saying that stuff like Basque and Catalan aren't proper languages, or only stuff like South American Spanish/American English?



No, I'm simply saying the roads to and the modes of  the individualization are a personal responsibility of ours I Am Herenow. 
Concerning Usted the similitude vuestra/vostro has maybe induced two similar mental activities in following a same course.

Ciao.


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## Arrius

*I am Herenow:* *"*I don't understand, are you guys saying that stuff like Basque and Catalan aren't proper languages, or only stuff like South American Spanish/American English?*"*

I shall leave Lorixnt2 to speak for himself. I can't think how you came to the above conclusion on the strength of what I said. I was thinking of Veneto as a recognisably different language from which a certain word had gone into mainstream modern Italian. But my Italian is rudimentary and my Veneto non-existent. I had just read this somewhere. It is sometimes quite difficult to say whether one is dealing with a dialect or a language. Basque is so different from anything else that it might be extra-terrestrial for all one knows of its origins, and Catalan quite distinct enough from Spanish to be considered a separate language, though its local cultural identity reinforces this view. The last native Cornish speaker died around 1785 but until she drew her last breath there was a separate living language distinct from the rest of the Celtic group. But there is a wise old Yiddish saying which means: "A language is a dialect with an army". Ciao,ciao! (;


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## Frank06

Hi,


Arrius said:


> It is sometimes quite difficult to say whether one is dealing with a dialect or a language.


Basically, it is rather easy: there simply _is no_ difference. The artifical distinction 'dialect/language' is one of the most 'un-linguistic' stances imaginable, yet one of the most persistent ones. 



> But there is a wise old Yiddish saying which means: "A language is a dialect with an army".


Is there? ;-)

Groetjes,

Frank


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## Outsider

Frank06 said:


> Basically, it is rather easy: there simply _is no_ difference. The artifical distinction 'dialect/language' is one of the most 'un-linguistic' stances imaginable, yet one of the most persistent ones.


But linguistics is not everything in life. I would say that there is a distinction, only it transcends linguistics, and lies on the murky terrain of politics. 
Basically, if your "dialect" has a country strong enough behind it saying it's a language, then it's a language. And if there's a country strong enough on the back of your "language" insisting that it's a dialect, then it's a dialect. 
Barring, of course, extremes such as if someone were crazy enough to claim that, say, Basque is a dialect of Spanish; but that would just sound ridiculous in any language.


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## jmx

Frank06 said:


> Basically, it is rather easy: there simply _is no_ difference. The artifical distinction 'dialect/language' is one of the most 'un-linguistic' stances imaginable, yet one of the most persistent ones.


I think the word "dialect" can be a useful tool. For example if I say "In language A they use the word X for this concept, but in the B dialect they often say Y", everyone will assume that A and B are close enough to be mutually understandable, and A more common or politically established than B.

Anyway, "dialect" can be misunderstood as something less valuable, and for this reason I tend to use "variant" instead.


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## Outsider

It's interesting how you phrased the issue, Jmartins. 
For me, the language is not 'A'; it's 'A + B'. 'A' just happens to be a privileged dialect within it.


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## Kraus

According to my dialectology book, the major difference between a dialect and a language is that you can use the former to speak about every subject (e.g. politics, science, law and so on) because it doesn't have the appropriate terms, while the latter is more "domestic".


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## Outsider

What that rather disingenuous definition (IMHO) leaves out is the _reason why_ dialects often lack the appropriate terms: because they were always proscribed from "higher-register" contexts.


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## Kraus

Outsider said:


> What that rather disingenuous definition (IMHO) leaves out is the _reason why_ dialects often lack the appropriate terms: because they were always proscribed from "higher-register" contexts.


Maybe because they were never the official language of a State, but I admit that it can hardly be a good explanation for that.


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## Lugubert

Kraus said:


> According to my dialectology book, the major difference between a dialect and a language is that you can use the former to speak about every subject (e.g. politics, science, law and so on) because it doesn't have the appropriate terms, while the latter is more "domestic".


On the other hand, it is quite possible that a "dialect" will have several local words for local occurrencies and customs that are foreign to the standard language. If there's a need for the "dialect" to discuss a foreign subject, it will have no problem in adapting loan words. There's a famous example of a region in north-eastern India which on the encounter of motor vehicles swiftly acquired the necessary skills as well as vocabulary to emerge as expert mechanics.

My favourite example on this controversy is what is spoken in parts of a rather mid-Swedish region (Dalarna/Dalecarlia), Älvdalsmålet ('the spoken language of the Dalälven river valley'). It isn't recognized as a minority language in the sense of EU legislation, but is almost perfectly incomprehensible to other Swedes, regardless of mother tongue. Yiddish, for some reason transcending my understanding, is now by law a recognized minority language. I understand more of Yiddish, it being a German dialect  , than of Älvdalsmålet.


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## Kraus

I'll try to transalte some quotations of my book: "So, today in Italy and everywhere in Europe, nobody would use the dialect to write a petition to the public authority, a PC user's handbook, a philosophical or microbiology treatise, and it's obvious for everybody that railway timetables, phone books, statementes of income, bank papers and insurance policies (...) should be written in the official language; these fields are intended solely for it [the official language] by social convention, in particolar in its written form".


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## Frank06

Hi,


jmartins said:


> I think the word "dialect" can be a useful tool.


Yes of course, but it highly depends upon the context.
I think I can easily and correctly state that English is a language and that English is a dialect (e.g. a Germanic dialect). That standard Dutch is a language and a dialect. That West-Flemish is a language and a dialect. That there are many Dutch dialects and many West-Flemish dialects.
IMHO, the problem does not only lie in the usage of the dichotomy dialect/language, but also in the overal and often implied use (incl. misuse, abuse) of labels for languages, such as the label 'English. As if 'English' is a, or rather, one single monolithic thing. The second problem lies in the absence (I think) of a term like German "Kultursprache", although standard language (or standardized language) comes close. I mean, many people confuse 'English' with what they find in a grammar book they had to study in school.



> Anyway, "dialect" can be misunderstood as something less valuable, and for this reason I tend to use "variant" instead.


It's a pity that this often seems to be the case, even though everybody _is_ speaking a dialect .

BTW, just as an anecdote about a very sharp distinction between dialect/language, or at least the perception of it. And here Outsider's post comes to mind:


> But linguistics is not everything in life. I would say that there is a distinction, only it transcends linguistics, and lies on the murky terrain of politics.
> Basically, if your "dialect" has a country strong enough behind it saying it's a language, then it's a language. And if there's a country strong enough on the back of your "language" insisting that it's a dialect, then it's a dialect.


 
Most of my Berber-speaking Moroccan students (normal people, not like the bunch of language freaks we are  refer to their mother tongue as a dialect ("_only_ a dialect" more precisely), while they regard Arabic as a language ("a _real_ language"), mainly because it is written (and there are obviously many other reasons). In 5 years, I met 1 Moroccan student who _knew_ that Berber is written, he knew about 5 signs/characters, out of 20/30 (my memory fails me here).
Now, would you consider Berber as a dialect because most speakers of Berber and most politicians in Morocco do so?
As a minor note: during one of the last elections in Algeria, some politicians translated Arabic slogans in French and in Berber.
Does this mean that Berber (any variant) is a language in country X and a dialect in country Y?

BTW, I prefer the linguistic approach...

Groetjes,

Frank


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## Outsider

Frank06 said:


> Does this mean that Berber (any variant) is a language in country X and a dialect in country Y?


That's actually a very common situation. "Dialect" and "language" are both subjective, socially constructed notions.


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## Athaulf

Kraus said:


> According to my dialectology book, the major difference between a dialect and a language is that you can use the former to speak about every subject (e.g. politics, science, law and so on) because it doesn't have the appropriate terms, while the latter is more "domestic".



There is an obvious problems with such a definition: what about languages that are spoken in societies that don't deal with many subjects relevant to the modern civilization? According to this definition, they are "dialects." But dialects of what language?


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## Athaulf

Outsider said:


> What that rather disingenuous definition (IMHO) leaves out is the _reason why_ dialects often lack the appropriate terms: because they were always proscribed from "higher-register" contexts.



Another complication is that one can find historical examples of languages with a tradition of use in certain "higher-register" contexts, but not in others. For example, in the 16th and 17th century, many European languages were actively used for political, legal, military, and administrative purposes, and accordingly had the vocabulary necessary to discuss those subjects. At that point, they also had rich literary traditions. However, they lacked the vocabulary of science, which was still done entirely in Latin. 

So was Latin the only real language back then? The above definition would suggest so, since in most places, it was still the only language in which one could discuss _every _subject. I'm sure one could find similar examples even today.


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## karuna

Kraus said:


> According to my dialectology book, the major difference between a dialect and a language is that you can use the former to speak about every subject (e.g. politics, science, law and so on) because it doesn't have the appropriate terms, while the latter is more "domestic".



I don't really think it works in many cases. For example, in Latvia we have several dialects of the Latvian language, each with unique features, vocabulary, grammar, pitch accents but also sharing most of the vocabulary. The standard language is based on the middle dialect but there are no subjects you couldn't discuss in other dialects as well because it is the same Latvian language. All terms can be adapted in each dialect "on the fly".

I would say that the difference between language and dialect is mutual understandability. If you can understand it without previous exposure to that language then it is a dialect. Although there still can be a debate about what is considered "mutual understandability".


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## Frank06

Hi,


Kraus said:


> According to my dialectology book, the major difference between a dialect and a language is that you can use the former to speak about every subject (e.g. politics, science, law and so on) because it doesn't have the appropriate terms, while the latter is more "domestic".


 
I'm incredibly curious which dialectologist writes something like that. Do you have some references?

Thanks

Frank


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## Kraus

Frank06 said:


> Hi,
> 
> 
> I'm incredibly curious which dialectologist writes something like that. Do you have some references?
> 
> Thanks
> 
> Frank


Yes, I have, of course: the book is "Fondamenti di dialettologia italiana" (Grassi, Sobrero, Telmon), Edizioni Laterza 1997


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## Kraus

karuna said:


> I don't really think it works in many cases. For example, in Latvia we have several dialects of the Latvian language, each with unique features, vocabulary, grammar, pitch accents but also sharing most of the vocabulary. The standard language is based on the middle dialect but there are no subjects you couldn't discuss in other dialects as well because it is the same Latvian language. All terms can be adapted in each dialect "on the fly".
> 
> I would say that the difference between language and dialect is mutual understandability. If you can understand it without previous exposure to that language then it is a dialect. Although there still can be a debate about what is considered "mutual understandability".


Well, I have many doubts too about that book. Though, as one of my favourite writers says, "The dialect is honest because it makes use of little words, and truth is in the little words" (Guareschi)


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## jous

I think it was Tore Janson (former Prof. of Linguistics) who wrote that a dialect becomes a language when it has *a name* for itself. Thus he discounts the existence of "Italian" during Dante Alighieri's lifetime seeing as he never defined it as a language separate from Latin in his writings, like it was in texts some 20 years (or something) after his death.

I believe he came to the conclusion through his studies of Bantu languages. Which are many-many, of course. Not sure I agree with the thesis, but it does get one to think.

Hi by the way. First-ever post.


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## ic/ego

Whether or not two dialects are separate languages or dialects of the same language seems to depend only on whether or not the people speaking the dialects consider themselves to be the same people or not.  Thus, Scandinavian speakers can generally understand each other, but consider their languages to be separate (the same is true of Afrikaans and Dutch), while some speakers of German cannot understand each other, but think of both of their speech patterns as the same German language.  The same can be said of the Chinese dialects, even though the difference between them is even greater.

When a language straddles a cultural divide (Serbian/Croatian or Hindi/Urdu), its speakers may be especially resisitant to calling it the same language, even though they are not very different.


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