Prestige (sociolinguistics)

In sociolinguistics, prestige is the level of respect normally accorded to a specific language or dialect within a particular speech community, relative to other languages or dialects. Sociolinguistic prestige is therefore one manifestation of, or analogous to, the more general phenomenon of social stratification – especially class. In general, a language or dialect associated with an upper class has positive prestige, while a language or dialect associated with a lower class has "negative prestige". Historical examples of prestige languages include the court languages used by royal elites. At the opposite extreme, members of underclasses have often communicated in particular forms of cant.

Prestige languages/dialects are often tied closely to a standardized language/dialect, in that the latter is usually considered more prestigious within a speech community, than a language/dialect that diverges significantly from linguistic norms. However, there are many exceptions to this rule, such as Arabic, in which Egyptian Arabic is widely used in mass media aimed at international audiences, while Literary Arabic (also known as Standard Arabic) is a more prestigious form.