matrilect

English

Etymology

matri- +‎ -lect

Noun

matrilect (plural matrilects)

1. (linguistics) The language of the dominant local culture, in the situation where a pidgin or creole is formed from the language of the dominant culture and another outside introduced language.
   • 1971, University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa Working Papers in Linguistics III, parts 3–4, page 20:

     However, as a satellect moves closer to its matrilect, it would seem as though the reverse process should take place: the rules should become more restrictive, less simple. The speakers would at first over-generalize; they would have rules which would permit utterances which were outside the limits of acceptability in the matrilect. Such rules would have to be restricted as the satellect approached its matrilect.

   • 1974, David De Camp, Ian F. Hancock, Pidgins and Creoles: Current Trends and Prospects, →ISBN, page 89:

     If one parent remains culturally dominant, however, the creole becomes a satellite ('satellect' or 'acolutholect') to that dominant language, which may be termed the 'matrilect'. In time, the creole normally begins recreolizing with the matrilect by borrowing from it. The different degrees in which the matrilect has been mixed into the creole consititute a 'gradatum' of overlapping systems in which the farthest from the matrilect at any moment is termed the 'basilect' by William Stewart.

   • 1977, Joseph Twadell Shipley, In praise of English: the growth & use of language, page 78:

     The highest level of good English has been called the acrolect; the lowest level of poor speech, the basilect; both are contrasted with the matrilect, the general native language.

   • 1990, Edward Herman Bendix, The Uses of Linguistics - Volume 583, →ISBN, page 43:

     In the process, as substantial numbers of black speakers underwent decreolization, their decreolized speech, although technically a mimolect, would have much of the surface form and therefore social status of a true matrilect, and would itself then serve as an additional model for those speakers further behind in the decreolization process.

   • 1995, Victor N. Webb, Language in South Africa, →ISBN, page 184:

     One colloquial variety of Afrikaans, called "Glaaitaal" (also known as "Tsotsitaal"), a highly syncretic slang, frequently spoken by younger generation black Africans in metropolitan areas and based in the Johannesburg area, amongst others, on Afrikaans as matrilect, has been investigated structurally and pragmatically to a limited extent, but not much is known regarding attitudinal aspects.

2. (linguistics) The idiolect of the mother or the mother's clan in a household where the mother and the father speak different idiolects.
   • 2013, Janet Chernela, “Toward an East Tukano ethnolinguistics: Metadiscursive practices, identity, and sustained linguistic diversity in the Vaupe/s basin of Brazil and Colombia”, in Upper Rio Negro: Cultural and Linguistic Interaction in Northwestern Amazonia, →ISBN, page 208:

     The Tariana preference to speak in matrilect to mother’s relatives, as reported by Aikhenvald, provides a strong comparative starting point for continued research on the norms of appropriate language use among Arawak Tariana and East Tukano speakers.

   • 2013, Christine Mallinson, Becky Childs, Gerard Van Herk, Data Collection in Sociolinguistics, →ISBN:

     Sui children rapidly learn to distinguish these clan-related dialects; young children may speak a mix of matrilect and patrilect, but older children and teenagers are almost fully patrilectal (Stanford, 2008b).

   • 2014, Martin Pütz, Justyna A. Robinson, Monika Reif, Cognitive Sociolinguistics, →ISBN, page 30:

     Stanford finds that women from the South who marry into North households maintain their Southern pattern almost perfectly, and children acquire much of this matrilect in their initial language learning period of 3 to 5 years of age.

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