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Definition 2024


chronolect

chronolect

English

Noun

chronolect (plural chronolects)

  1. (linguistics, sociolinguistics) A specific variety of a language at a given time in its history of development.
    Koine and Byzantine are chronolects of Greek.
    • 1981, Leuvense Bijdragen, Martinus Nijhoff Publishers, volume LXX, page 52:
      Taking lect in the sense of ‘variety’ (and not ‘social variety’), I have coined spatiolect ‘spatial variety’, chronolect ‘chronological variety’, communolect ‘variety of a community (however defined)’, ecolect ‘variety of an economic class’, ethnolect ‘variety of an ethnic group’, religiolect ‘variety of a religious group’, sexlect ‘variety of one of the sexes or of people with a certain sexual orientation’, urbolect ‘urban variety’, and rurolect ‘rural variety’.

(Compare topolect)