Language vs. Dialect

A number of languages are very similar to one another. However, for political reasons, they are often classified as languages rather than dialects. In other cases, however, languages are often classified as dialects.

The Danish, Norwegian and Swedish languages are similar to one another. Norwegian and Swedish have a similar sound system, and Danish and Norwegian share many words. Norwegian and Swedish in particular share a high degree of mutual intelligibility. Nevertheless, they are considered languages.

Hindi and Urdu are also similar. Hindi is spoken in India and Urdu in Pakistan, and the two languages have different scripts. Despite their high degree of mutual intelligibility, they are never considered dialects.

The term Serbo-Croatian was once used for the official language of the former Yugoslavia, but now the language has different names. It can be called Bosnian, Croatian, Montenegrin and Serbian. These are all mutually intelligible, but for political reasons different names are used.

Indonesian and Malay are mutually intelligible, but for political reasons, they are usually classified as languages. There are significant differences in spelling, grammar, pronunciation and vocabulary. The two varieties also use different loanwords.

The Dutch spoken in Belgium is often called Flemish. Though Flemish differs in many respects from Dutch, standard Dutch is taught in school. However, Belgians prefer to call their language Flemish.

China is a country with many languages. The most widely-spoken is Mandarin, but others such as Cantonese, Hakka and Wu are also spoken. Though they are not mutually intelligible, languages such as Cantonese are often called dialects. The reason is that they use the same script of Mandarin.

The Philippines is a country with over 100 languages. Tagalog, one of the official languages, is always referred to as a language. However, the regional languages, though they are not mutually intelligible, are often called dialects.

The difference between a dialect and a language is not always so clear. For political reasons, languages are often mutually intelligible but not considered dialects. In other cases, languages are often called dialects because they share the same writing system and because regional languages have less prestige than the official language. Languages have a higher status than dialects.