vernacular

(noun)

The native language or native dialect of a specific population, especially as distinguished from a literary, national, or standard variety of the language.

Related Terms

  • cloisonné
  • Machiavelli
  • Dante
  • Spenserian stanza
  • anthropocentric
  • Euclid
  • Gutenberg
  • Nicolaus Copernicus
  • the Reconquista
  • Thomistic
  • calligraphy
  • Hellenic

(noun)

The native language or native dialect of a specific population, especially as distinguished from a literary, national, or standard variety of the language, such as Latin.

Related Terms

  • cloisonné
  • Machiavelli
  • Dante
  • Spenserian stanza
  • anthropocentric
  • Euclid
  • Gutenberg
  • Nicolaus Copernicus
  • the Reconquista
  • Thomistic
  • calligraphy
  • Hellenic

Examples of vernacular in the following topics:

  • The Rise of the Vernacular

    • It was only in the 13th century that Italian authors began writing in their native vernacular language rather than Latin, French, or Provençal.
    • Leone Battista Alberti, the learned Greek and Latin scholar, wrote in the vernacular, and Vespasiano da Bisticci, while he was constantly absorbed in Greek and Latin manuscripts, wrote the Vite di uomini illustri, valuable for their historical contents, and rivalling the best works of the 14th century in their candour and simplicity.
    • The creation of the printing press (using movable type) by Johannes Gutenberg in the 1450s encouraged authors to write in their local vernacular rather than in Greek or Latin classical languages, widening the reading audience and promoting the spread of Renaissance ideas.
  • Domestic Architecture in Modern Africa

    • Vernacular architecture uses a wide range of materials, such as thatch, stick/wood, mud, mudbrick, rammed earth, and stone, with a preference for materials varying by region.
    • Neo-vernacular architecture, or new forms of vernacular architecture, continues, for instance with the Great Mosques of Nioro or New Gourna.
    • Lunda dwellings (from the Kingdom of Lunda, a pre-colonial African confederation of states in what is now the Democratic Republic of Congo, north-eastern Angola, and northwestern Zambia from c. 1665–1887) display the square and the cone-on-ground types of African vernacular architecture.
  • Art under the Ming Dynasty

    • Short fiction had been popular in China as far back as the Tang dynasty (618–907), and the works of contemporaneous Ming authors such as Xu Guangqi, Xu Xiake, and Song Yingxing were often technical and encyclopedic, but the most striking literary development during the Ming period was the vernacular novel.
    • While the gentry elite were educated enough to fully comprehend the language of classical Chinese, those with rudimentary educations—such as women in educated families, merchants, and shop clerks—became a large potential audience for literature and performing arts that employed vernacular Chinese.
    • In the later years of the dynasty, Feng Menglong and Ling Mengchu innovated with vernacular short fiction.
    • This highly individualistic school of poetry and prose was criticized by the Confucian establishment for its association with intense sensual lyricism, which was also apparent in Ming vernacular novels such as the Jin Ping Mei.
  • Renaissance Writers

    • He wrote poetry in Latin, notably the Punic War epic Africa, but is today remembered for his works in the Italian vernacular, especially the Canzoniere, a collection of love sonnets dedicated to his unrequited love Laura.
    • Written in the vernacular of the Florentine language, it is considered a masterpiece of classical early Italian prose.
    • Boccaccio wrote his imaginative literature mostly in the Italian vernacular, as well as other works in Latin, and is particularly noted for his realistic dialogue which differed from that of his contemporaries, medieval writers who usually followed formulaic models for character and plot.
    • In De vulgari eloquentia (On Eloquence in the Vernacular), however, Dante defended use of the vernacular in literature.
  • Arts and Sciences

    • The most important development of late medieval literature was the ascendancy of the vernacular languages.
    • The vernacular had been in use in England since the 8th century and in France since the 11th century.
    • Though Italy was later in evolving a native literature in the vernacular language, it was here that the most important developments of the period were to come.
    • The application of the vernacular did not entail a rejection of Latin, and both Dante and Boccaccio wrote prolifically in Latin as well as Italian, as would Petrarch later (whose Canzoniere also promoted the vernacular and is considered the first modern lyric poetry collection).
  • The Working Class

    • Since many members of the working class, as defined by academic models, are often identified in the vernacular as being middle class, there is considerable ambiguity over the term's meaning.
  • The Bhakti Movement

    • This period was also characterized by a spate of devotional literature in vernacular prose and poetry in the ethnic languages of the various Indian states or provinces.
  • Balanced Scorecards

    • Today, this second-generation balanced scorecard is often referred to as a "strategy map", but the vernacular "balanced scorecard" is still used to refer to anything consistent with a pictographic strategic management tool.
  • The Popularization of Science

    • Most of these texts were published in the local vernacular, so their continental spread depended on the language of the readers.
    • The publication of Bernard de Fontenelle's Conversations on the Plurality of Worlds (1686) marked the first significant work that expressed scientific theory and knowledge expressly for the laity, in the vernacular, and with the entertainment of readers in mind.
  • Parasitic Skin Diseases

    • Another vernacular name is plumber's itch.
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