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Language: Variants | |
| acrolect | a variety of language closest to the prestige form. |
| argot | an often more or less secret vocabulary and idiom peculiar to a particular group. |
| argotic | relating to ARGOT. |
| bafflegab | official or professional jargon which confuses more than it clarifies. |
| balderdash | nonsense language. |
| bantu | a name given to a large group of African languages. |
| baragouin | any jargon or unintelligible language. |
| basilect+ | debased dialect. |
| bidialectal | speaking two dialects. |
| billingsgate | coarsely abusive language. [From a fish market in London, notorious for the crude language heard there]. |
| blinglish+ | English mixed with black slang. |
| bureaucratese | the language of bureaucrats. |
| calo | a Spanish argot used by chicano youths: CALOS(+). |
| cant | the vocabulary or language peculiar to a particular group or sect, esp. thieves; (verb) to speak this. |
| centum | a hundred; centum languages: a classification group of Indo-European languages, in which an original palatal consonant developed as a guttural. Cf. SATEM. |
| cockney | London dialect esp of the East End. |
| creole | a language formerly a PIDGIN which has developed and become the accepted language of a region, esp in the W. Indies. |
| creolise creolize | to PIDGINIZE. |
| creolist | a person who studies CREOLE languages. |
| demotic | popular, common; of or relating to the form of Modern Greek that is based on everyday speech; (noun) the popular form of a language. |
| dialect | a regional variety of a language. |
| dialectal | relating to a dialect: DIALECTALLY |
| diglossia+ | the coexistence of a prestige language and a lower language. |
| diglossic+ | relating to DIGLOSSIA, the coexistence of a prestige language and a lower language. |
| diplomatese | the language of diplomacy. |
| doublespeak | language used to deceive usually through concealment or misrepresentation of truth. |
| ebonics | the slang of African Americans. [From ebony + phonics]. |
| educationese | the jargon used esp. by educational theorists. |
| franglais | a mixture of French and English. |
| gallicism | a French turn of expression. |
| geechee | a dialect of rural black people in the southern US. |
| geekspeak+ | the jargon used by geeks. |
| gobbledegook gobbledygook | unintelligible official jargon; rubbish, nonsense. |
| governmentese | jargon held to be characteristic of government officials. |
| greenspeak | ecological jargon. |
| idioglossia | a secret speech or language, especially invented by children. |
| idiolect | the language usage pattern unique to a person. |
| jargon | a specialised language for a trade etc |
| jargoneer | a person who uses JARGON. |
| jargonise jargonize | to express in JARGON. |
| jargonish | like JARGON. |
| jargonist | one addicted to JARGON; one who uses cant or slang. |
| jargonistic | in the manner of a JARGONIST. |
| jargony | like JARGON. |
| jive | jargon, orig. of Harlem and jazz musicians. |
| jockney | coined from jock and cockney for a supposed Scottish dialect. |
| joual | a non-standard, chiefly urban variety of French. |
| journalese | the JARGON of bad journalism. |
| koine | a dialect that spreads to become common language of a region. [GK. koine, common]. |
| langue | a language viewed as an abstract system used by a speech-community, in contrast to the actual linguistic behaviour of individuals. |
| latinity | the Latin tongue, style, or idiom, or the use thereof; specifically, purity of Latin style or idiom. |
| ledden | language, dialect, speech. |
| legalese | complicated legal JARGON. |
| lingo | language: LINGOES. |
| mellowspeak | a bland non-assertive form of language associated with New Age philosophy. |
| mockney+ | an imitation COCKNEY accent; a person who affects this. |
| motherese+ | a simplified and repetitive type of speech used by adults in speaking to babies. |
| newspeak | deliberately ambiguous and contradictory language used to mislead and manipulate the public. [Coined by George Orwell]. |
| novelese | the language of inferior novels. |
| officialese | the characteristic language of official statements. |
| palabra | (Spanish) a word; talk: PALABRAS. |
| patois | a dialect (orig. in France) of the common people in a particular area, differing fundamentally from the literary language; any non-standard local dialect. |
| pidgeon pidgin | a simplified speech used for communication between people with different languages. |
| pidginize | to make into PIDGIN. |
| polonism | a Polish idiom or characteristic. |
| psychobabble | language laden with jargon from psychotherapy or psychiatry used without much concern for accuracy. |
| putonghua+ | the Chinese language, standard Mandarin. |
| reo+ | a New Zealand language: REOS. |
| sabir | a French-based pidgin language. |
| satem | a classification group of Indo-European languages, in which an original palatal consonant developed as a sibilant. No -S. Cf. CENTUM. |
| scamto+ | the argot of urban S. African blacks: SCAMTOS. |
| seaspeak | a restricted variety of English used by sailors etc. for unambiguous communication. |
| shelta | a secret jargon used by vagrants in Britain and Ireland. [Shelru, poss a perversion of OIr béulra language]. |
| shoptalk | any specialist jargon. |
| signage | the use of sign language. |
| slang | extremely informal or vulgar language; (verb) to use slang. |
| slangish | slangy. |
| slanguage | a slang language. |
| slangular | slangy. |
| slangy | full of slang: SLANGIER, SLANGIEST; SLANGILY. |
| sociolect | a variety of languages used by members of a particular social class or group. |
| subdialect | a subdivision of a dialect. |
| taal+ | language, usually by implication Afrikaans. |
| technobabble | technical jargon. |
| telegraphese | language characterized by the terseness and ellipses that are common in telegrams. |
| tsotsitaal+ | the street slang used by TSOTSIS, South African street hooligans. |
| verlan+ | a variety of French slang using back-to-front words and Arab words. |
| vernacular | indigenous, native, spoken by the people of the country or of one's own country; (noun) a vernacular language, expression, or mode of expression. |
| weblish | the language of text messages. |