Högskolan i Skövde

This study describes how Swedish linguistics normally defines the denomination grounded on dichotomy of concepts as standard (language) and regional dialect, and what is considered falling in between the places of these basic concepts. Advantages and disadvantages regarding constructions of such geographically defined conceptual systems are analysed and evaluated. Normally, there is a compartmentalization into a number of vague forms of language fluctuating between standard and regional dialect, where the linguistic frontier dividing them is difficult to define; it is generally drawn on haphazardly chosen indexations of language specifics. Moreover, the link between different forms of language and their geographical habitat is superficial, unsystematic, and arbitrary. Distinctions of language determined by habitat are described as either complete systems or as varieties. Many linguists emphasize - although using conceptual systems of this kind - the failings of them in their description of a contemporary language situation.