Mimolect

noun

noun ·Rare ·Advanced level

Definitions

Noun
  1. 1
    A xenolect that has become separated from its matrilect both geographically and communicatively.

    "At some point in the decreolization process, however, xenolectal structures become masked by surface-structure mimicry of the matrilect, so that the apparent degree of xenolecticity of the evolving mimolect drops below the real level, as represented by the crossover of A-B and C-D."

Example

More examples

"At some point in the decreolization process, however, xenolectal structures become masked by surface-structure mimicry of the matrilect, so that the apparent degree of xenolecticity of the evolving mimolect drops below the real level, as represented by the crossover of A-B and C-D."

Etymology

From mimo- + -lect.

Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.