See Lect . Dialect, language, standard.
Most languages have dialects, each with a distinctive accent, grammar, vocabulary, and idiom.
Many users of a standard variety have tended to look down on dialect speakers as more or less 'illiterate' and teachers have often sought to impose the standard throughout a country and eliminate or greatly reduce all other 'deviant', 'low', or 'vulgar' forms, with the occasional exception of some limited 'good' dialect. As a result of such factors, there is a long-standing tension among such words as dialect, standard , and language . See Standard . A dialect continuum. During the 19 - 20c there has been considerable study of dialects in their own right and in relation to the standard variety of a language.