Ausbausprache - Abstandsprache - Dachsprache

Ausbausprache (also called "ausbau language") is a language which has a standard spelling, a standard grammar and a relatively wide and clear vocabulary (and is thus almost identical with a standard language). Two language forms that allow easy mutual communication can nevertheless be regarded as two different languages if they are each an Ausbausprache according to this definition. Good examples are Serbian and Croatian, Dutch and Afrikaans and to some some extent Hindi and Urdu. See also Abstandsprache.

Abstandsprache (also called "abstand language") is a language form that is so different from every other language that it cannot be regarded as a dialect of any another language, whether or not it is itself an Ausbausprache (almost identical with standard language).

Dachsprache means a language form that serves as standard language for different dialects, mostly in a dialect continuum, even though these dialects may be so different, that mutual intellegibility is not possible on the basilectal level between all dialects, particularly those separated by significant geographical distance. In 1982 in Switzerland Romansh (by then called "Rumantsch Grischun" by most of its speakers) was successfully created by Heinrich Schmid as such a Dachsprache for a number of quite different Romance language forms. Standard German to some extent functions in the same way.

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