Sociolect

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In sociolinguistics, a sociolect is a form of language (non-standard dialect, restricted register) or a set of lexical items used by a socioeconomic class, profession, age group, or other social group.^[1][2]

Sociolects involve both passive acquisition of particular communicative practices through association with a local community, as well as active learning and choice among speech or writing forms to demonstrate identification with particular groups.^[3] The term sociolect might refer to socially restricted dialects,^[4] but it is sometimes also treated as equivalent with the concept of register,^[5] or used as a synonym for jargon and slang.^[6][7]

Sociolinguists—people who study sociolects and language variation—define a sociolect by examining the social distribution of specific linguistic terms. For example, a sociolinguist would examine the use of the second person pronoun you within a given population. If one distinct social group used yous as the plural form of the pronoun, then this could indicate the existence of a sociolect. A sociolect is distinct from a regional dialect (regiolect) because social class, rather than geographical subdivision, substantiates the unique linguistic features.^[8]