Glossary of Linguistic Terms

dark l The l sound in ale (except for the varieties in certain regions of Wales and Ireland), as opposed to the clear l, the sound found in words like light. dative See case.
declarative A type of sentence that makes statements (e.g., it rained yesterday). To be contrasted with the interrogative, which poses questions (e.g., did it rain yesterday?).
declension Refers to infl ections of nouns (e.g., book/books, man/men), pronouns (e.g., they/them), and, in case of OE and Early ME, adjectives (e.g., eald cyning ‘old king’/ ealdes cyninges ‘old king’s’).
determiner A word that occurs with a noun to restrict its meaning: e.g., the, this, that.
diachronic Pertaining to historical dimensions of language: e.g., linguistic change over the course of time. Cf. synchronic.
dialect, historical Old English dialects include Anglian (which consists of Northumbrian and Mercian), Kentish, and West Saxon. From the late tenth century onwards, late West Saxon was widely used as a written standard. Middle English dialects are conventionally identifi ed by the regions like Northern, Midlands, and Southern, although they comprised a continuum with many more varieties. The dialect of London, which evolved in stages during the late Middle English period, became a privilege dialect on which the standard form for ModE was based.
dialect, social In a society where two or more non-standard linguistic varieties are used, the one whose prestige is lower than the other(s) is the basilect, while the one with prestige is the acrolect (often serving as local standard); any variety that falls in between is a mesolect. Any variety of a language used by a specifi c individual is considered an idiolect. dialectology The study of dialects.