Language is always changing, evolving, and adapting to the needs of its users

Dialect, a variety of a language that signals where a person comes from. The notion is usually interpreted geographically (regional dialect), but it also has some application in relation to a person’s social background (class dialect) or occupation (occupational dialect). The word dialect comes from the Ancient Greek dialektos “discourse, language, dialect,” which is derived from dialegesthai “to discourse, talk.” A dialect is chiefly distinguished from other dialects of the same language by features of linguistic structure—i.e., grammar (specifically morphology and syntax) and vocabulary. In morphology (word formation), various dialects in the Atlantic states have clim, clum, clome, or cloome instead of climbed, and, in syntax (sentence structure), there are “sick to his stomach,” “sick at his stomach,” “sick in,” “sick on,” and “sick with.” On the level of vocabulary, examples of dialectal differences include American English subway, contrasting with British English underground; and corn, which means “maize” in the United States, Canada, and Australia, “wheat” in England, and “oats” in Scotland. Nevertheless, while dialects of the same language differ, they still possess a common core of features.

The most widespread type of dialectal differentiation is regional, or geographic. As a rule, the speech of one locality differs at least slightly from that of any other place. Differences between neighbouring local dialects are usually small, but, in traveling farther in the same direction, differences accumulate.The basic cause of dialectal differentiation is linguistic change. Every living language constantly undergoes changes in its various elements. Because languages are extremely complex systems of signs, it is inconceivable that linguistic evolution could affect the same elements and even transform them in the same way in all localities where one language is spoken and for all speakers in the same locality. At first glance, differences caused by linguistic change seem to be slight, but they inevitably accumulate with time (e.g., compare Chaucer’s English with modern English or Latin with modern Italian, French, Spanish, or Romanian). Related languages usually begin as dialects of the same language.