dialect

noun, often attributive di·a·lect \ ˈdī-ə-ˌlekt \

Updated on: 7 Apr 2018

Definition of dialect

1 linguistics

a : a regional variety of language distinguished by features of vocabulary, grammar, and pronunciation from other regional varieties and constituting together with them a single language

the Doric dialect of ancient Greek

a dialect of Chinese spoken in Hong Kong

b : one of two or more cognate (see ¹cognate 3a) languages

French and Italian are Romance dialects

c : a variety of a language used by the members of a group

such dialects as politics and advertising
—Philip Howard

d : a variety of language whose identity is fixed by a factor other than geography (such as social class)

spoke a rough peasant dialect

e : register 4c

f : a version of a computer programming language

2 : manner or means of expressing oneself : phraseology

—

dialectal

play \ˌdī-ə-ˈlek-tᵊl\ adjective

—

dialectally

play \-tə-lē\ adverb

See dialect defined for English-language learners

See dialect defined for kids

Examples of dialect in a Sentence

They speak a southern dialect of French.
The author uses dialect in his writing.
The play was hard to understand when the characters spoke in dialect.

Recent Examples of dialect from the Web

Many were rapping in their own dialects -- keeping alive their local culture, as opposed to the official language of Mandarin -- and experimenting with sounds, incorporating Chinese instruments with rap beats.

— marian liu, CNN, "Hatin' on hip hop: China's rap scene frustrated by crackdown," 29 Mar. 2018
Born in China and raised in Taiwan, Wu speaks Mandarin and a niche Chinese dialect, but little English.

— naomi kooker, BostonGlobe.com, "You’ll leave Winchester’s China Sky with a smile," 16 Mar. 2018
This week’s trivia question: What dialect is most widely spoken in San Francisco’s Chinatown?

— gary kamiya, San Francisco Chronicle, "Corrupt, inhumane reform school was SF’s first form of juvenile justice," 16 Mar. 2018
There was rarely the time or the budgetary freedom to send these journeypeople off to dialect coaches, even if the priority was verisimilitude rather than getting 22 episodes in the can as fast as humanly possible.

— dan sheehan, GQ, "Let’s Celebrate the Worst Irish Accents of All Time," 15 Mar. 2018
The gospel of the thin, dry pizza continues to spread, and with it, the vernacular apizza, a vestige of Neapolitan dialect.

— arthur bovino, Bon Appetit, "8 Styles of Regional Pizza to Know, Love, and Cherish," 12 Mar. 2018
Some are speaking various dialects from Africa, Arabia.

— mary morris, The Atlantic, "Fiction: Mama’s Haven," 11 Mar. 2018
As Nicola Davis reports for The Guardian, researchers believed their adept imitation skills could explain how orca pods develop different dialects overtime.

— jason daley, Smithsonian, "Whale Talk Pretty One Day: Listen to an Orca Mimic Human Words," 1 Feb. 2018
For example, Edden hopes to create text-to-speech software in which health information can be provided in any regional accent or dialect, so that the user hears a familiar voice.

— jessica wapner, Newsweek, "The Cancer Epidemic in Central Appalachia," 19 July 2015

These example sentences are selected automatically from various online news sources to reflect current usage of the word 'dialect.' Views expressed in the examples do not represent the opinion of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.

Dialectic: Logic through Conversation

Dialectic is a term used in philosophy, and the fact that it is closely connected to the ideas of Socrates and Plato is completely logical—even from an etymological point of view. Plato’s famous dialogues frequently presented Socrates playing a leading role, and dialogue comes from the Greek roots dia- (“through” or “across”) and -logue (“discourse” or “talk”). Dialect and dialectic come from dialecktos (“conversation” or “dialect”) and ultimately back to the Greek word dialegesthai, meaning “to converse.”

Conversation or dialogue was indeed at the heart of the “Socratic method,” through which Socrates would ask probing questions which cumulatively revealed his students’ unsupported assumptions and misconceptions. The goal, according to the definition in our Unabridged Dictionary, was to “elicit a clear and consistent expression of something supposed to be implicitly known by all rational beings.”

Other philosophers had specific uses of the term dialectic, including Aristotelianism, Stoicism, Kantianism, Hegelianism, and Marxism. Asking a series of questions was considered by Socrates a method of “giving birth” to the truth, and a related word, maieutic, defined as “relating to or resembling the Socratic method of eliciting new ideas from another,” comes from the Greek word meaning “of midwifery.”