the study of language in relation to society and culture
metalinguistics in American English
(ˌmɛtəlɪŋˈgwɪstɪks)
US
noun
the branch of linguistics dealing with relations between language and other elements of a culture
metalinguistics in American English
(ˌmetəlɪŋˈɡwɪstɪks)
noun
(used with a sing v)
the study of the relation between languages and the other cultural systems they refer to
Word origin
[1945–50; meta- + linguistics]This word is first recorded in the period 1945–50. Other words that entered Englishat around the same time include: RNA, beeper, individual medley, shootout, spin-offmeta- is a prefix appearing in loanwords from Greek, with the meanings “after,” “alongwith,” “beyond,” “among,” “behind,” and productive in English on the Greek model.Other words that use the affix meta- include: metacarpus, metagenesis
Examples of 'metalinguistics' in a sentence
metalinguistics
These are the unsatisfactory, confused, wrong results of a questionnaire on metalinguistics administered to 19 graduates.
Cristina Lavinio 2012, '(IN)COMPETENZE METALINGUISTICHE DI BASE IN LAUREATI IN LETTERE', Italiano LinguaDuehttp://riviste.unimi.it/index.php/promoitals/article/view/1925. Retrieved from DOAJ CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/legalcode)