topolect
Word Rarity
Very rare
Frequency: Zipf frequency 0.00 in modern English
12
Scrabble Score
8
Letters
1
Syllables
6
Unique Chars
Meaning
noun
A regional variety of Chinese; especially a lect other than Standard Mandarin.
Example Sentences
- "We can then establish and name further categories by means of the word "group" and the prefix "sub-", thus obtaining SUBDIALECT ("Untermundart") between topolect and dialect, DIALECT GROUP ("Mundartengruppe") between dialect and language, SUBFAMILY ("Unterfamilie") between language and family,"
- "The degree to which Yahudic lects differ from coterritorial non-Jewish lects varies spatially, chronologically, stylistically, and idiolectically (for this reason it is important to study each Yahudic topolect together with its coterritorial Arabic topolect if it has one)."
- "Imminent Chinese linguist Zhou Youguang has said that everyone’s mother tongue is a topolect, whereas China’s standard spoken language has long been the “teacher tongue.”"
Etymology
Combination of topo- (“place”) + -lect (“[language] variety”). Attested since the 1960s, but rare until its introduction by sinologist Victor Mair in 1991 to distinguish Chinese 方言 (fāngyán) from English dialect.