dyslexia

English

Etymology

Learned borrowing from French dyslexie and/or German Dyslexie, coined by German ophthalmologist Rudolf Berlin in 1887, from dys- +‎ lexis +‎ -ia, from Ancient Greek δυσ- (dus-) + λέξις (léxis, “diction”, “word”), from Ancient Greek λέγω (légō, “to speak”), ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *leg- (“to collect, gather; to speak”). The term was coined with λέξις (léxis) being taken to mean "reading," likely due to semantic conflation of Greek λέγω (légō, “to speak”) and Latin legō (“to read”). By surface analysis, dys +‎ lex(is) +‎ -ia.

Pronunciation

• enPR: dĭs-lĕkʹsē-ə, IPA^(key): /dɪsˈlɛk.si.ə/

• Audio (Southern England):

  (file)

Noun

dyslexia (countable and uncountable, plural dyslexias)

2. (neurology, pathology) A learning disability characterized by reading and writing difficulties.

Synonyms

• word-blindness

Antonyms

• hyperlexia

Derived terms

• dyslexia-friendly

Related terms

• dyslectic
• dyslexic
• dyslexify

Translations

learning disability

• Afrikaans: disleksie
• Asturian: dislexa f
• Basque: dislexia
• Catalan: dislèxia (ca) f
• Chinese:

  Mandarin: 失讀症 / 失读症 (zh) (shīdúzhèng), 閱讀障礙 / 阅读障碍 (zh) (yuèdú zhàng'ài)

• Cornish: gerdhelni m
• Czech: dyslexie (cs) f
• Danish: ordblindhed c, dysleksi c
• Dutch: dyslexie (nl) f
• Egyptian Arabic: ديسلكسيا ?
• Esperanto: disleksio
• Estonian: düsleksia, vaeglugemine
• Faroese: orðblindi n
• Finnish: lukivaikeus, dysleksia (fi)
• French: dyslexie (fr) f
• Galician: dislexia f
• Georgian: დისლექსია (disleksia)
• German: Legasthenie (de) f, Dyslexie (de) f
• Greek: δυσλεξία (el) f (dyslexía)
• Haitian Creole: disleksi
• Hebrew: דִּיסְלֶקְצִיָּה (he) f (disléktsya)
• Hungarian: diszlexia (hu)
• Icelandic: lesblinda (is) f
• Indonesian: disleksia (id)
• Irish: disléicse f
• Italian: dislessia (it) f
• Japanese: 失読症 (ja) (しつどくしょう, shitsudokushō), ディスレクシア (ja) (disurekushia)
• Korean: 난독증(難讀症) (nandokjeung)
• Kurdish:

  Northern Kurdish: dîsleksiye

• Latin: dyslexia f
• Latvian: disleksija f
• Malay: disleksia
• Manx: neulhaihderys m
• Maori: (mate) tīpaopao kupu
• Norwegian:

  Bokmål: dysleksi m

  Nynorsk: dysleksi m

• Polish: dysleksja (pl) f
• Portuguese: dislexia (pt) f
• Punjabi: ਡਿਸਲੇਕਸੀਆ (ḍislekasīā)
• Romanian: dislexie (ro) f
• Russian: дислекси́я (ru) f (disleksíja)
• Scottish Gaelic: doille-fhaclan f
• Serbo-Croatian:

  Cyrillic: дислѐксија f

  Roman: dislèksija (sh) f

• Slovak: dyslexia f
• Spanish: dislexia (es) f
• Swedish: dyslexi (sv) c, ordblindhet c
• Tamil: டிஸ்லெக்சியா (ṭislekciyā)
• Turkish: disleksi (tr)
• Ukrainian: дислексія f (dysleksija)
• Vietnamese: chứng khó đọc
• Welsh: dyslecsia m

See also

• alexia
• dyscalculia
• dysgraphia

References

• “dyslexia”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.
• “dyslexia, n.”, in Lexico, Dictionary.com; Oxford University Press, 2019–2022.
• William Dwight Whitney, Benjamin E[li] Smith, editors (1911), “dyslexia”, in The Century Dictionary […], New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., →OCLC, page 1811, column 1.
• William Dwight Whitney and Benjamin E[li] Smith, editors (1914), “dyslexia”, in The Century Dictionary: An Encyclopedic Lexicon of the English Language, revised edition, volume II, New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., →OCLC, page 1811, column 1.
• "dyslexia" in Online Etymology Dictionary.
• "dyslexia" in Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary.
• "dyslexia, n." in Oxford English Dictionary (online edition).

Anagrams

• lysdexia

Latin

Etymology

New Latin produced from dys- +‎ lexis +‎ -ia, a calque of German Dyslexie, coined by German ophthalmologist Rudolf Berlin in 1887, from Ancient Greek δυσ- (dus-) expressing the idea of difficulty, and λέξις (léxis, “speech”; “diction”; “word”).

Pronunciation

• (Classical Latin) IPA^(key): [dysˈɫɛk.si.a]
• (modern Italianate Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): [d̪izˈlɛk.si.a]

Noun

dyslexia f (genitive dyslexiae); first declension (New Latin)

1. (Contemporary Latin) dyslexia

Declension

First-declension noun.

	singular	plural
nominative	dyslexia	dyslexiae
genitive	dyslexiae	dyslexiārum
dative	dyslexiae	dyslexiīs
accusative	dyslexiam	dyslexiās
ablative	dyslexiā	dyslexiīs
vocative	dyslexia	dyslexiae

Descendants

• → English: dyslexia (learned)

Slovak

Noun

dyslexia f (genitive singular dyslexie, nominative plural dyslexie, genitive plural dyslexií)

1. (neurology, pathology) dyslexia

References

• “dyslexia”, in Slovníkový portál Jazykovedného ústavu Ľ. Štúra SAV [Dictionary portal of the Ľ. Štúr Institute of Linguistics, Slovak Academy of Science] (in Slovak), https://slovnik.juls.savba.sk, 2003–2025