sociolect
/ˈsoʊ.ʃi.əˌlɛkt/
Word Rarity
Very rare
Frequency: Zipf frequency 0.00 in modern English
13
Scrabble Score
9
Letters
4
Syllables
7
Unique Chars
Meaning
noun
The variant of language used by a social group such as a socioeconomic class, an ethnic group, an age group, etc.
Example Sentences
- "The French literary critic Roland Barthes has paid special attention to the relationship between the individual language ("idiolect") and the language of a collective of speech ("sociolect"). Public life is characterized by "social multilingualism." There are a number of languages, such as the language of the church, the language of the prison, the language of the children, the language of the ruling elite, and other "social languages.""
- "[…] I believe that it is mistaken to maintain that the language of ideology is a discrete ‘sociolect’, a sort of meta-language which draws upon but remains distinct from the language of everyday life."
- "This paper uses sociolect as a cover term for slang, technical jargon (professionalisms), and argot. From the point of view of its secret nature, two kinds of sociolects are distinguished: slang and technical jargon on the one hand, and argot on the other, with the difference being in the presence or lack of an intention of secrecy."
- "In sociolinguistics, a sociolect or social dialect is a variety of language (a register) associated with a social group such as a socioeconomic class, an ethnic group (precisely termed ethnolect), an age group, etc. Sociolects involve both passive acquisition of particular communicative practices through association with a local community, as well as active learning and choice among speech or writing forms to demonstrate identification with particular grounds. Sociolinguists define a sociolect by examining the social distribution of specific linguistic terms."
Etymology
Word Breakdown
Regional Pronunciation
- American English: /ˈsoʊ.ʃi.əˌlɛkt/
- British English: /ˈsəʊ.ʃɪ.ə(ʊ).lɛkt/