as in language
the stock of words, pronunciation, and grammar used by a people as their basic means of communication
although the anthropologist could speak the local language fairly well, she was always glad to find someone who shared her mother tongue
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Recent Examples of mother tongue
How could someone who’d left China in fifth grade have kept up her mother tongue so well?
—
Shuang Xuetao, The New Yorker, 24 Nov. 2024
The show opened with songs in Mukherjee’s mother tongue Bengali, that were composed, written and sung by famous Bengali musicians including Nobel Prize awardee Rabindranath Tagore.
—Riddhi Doshi, CNN, 28 Jan. 2025
The theme is the conflict between mother tongues and other tongues.
—Jesse Green, New York Times, 24 Jan. 2025
Czesław Miłosz found in himself the heart to give up the terrain of his mother tongue, and to keep writing poems in Polish.
—Robert Pinsky, The New Yorker, 30 Jan. 2025
See All Example Sentences for mother tongue
Shuang Xuetao, The New Yorker, 24 Nov. 2024
The show opened with songs in Mukherjee’s mother tongue Bengali, that were composed, written and sung by famous Bengali musicians including Nobel Prize awardee Rabindranath Tagore.
—Riddhi Doshi, CNN, 28 Jan. 2025
The theme is the conflict between mother tongues and other tongues.
—Jesse Green, New York Times, 24 Jan. 2025
Czesław Miłosz found in himself the heart to give up the terrain of his mother tongue, and to keep writing poems in Polish.
—Robert Pinsky, The New Yorker, 30 Jan. 2025
See All Example Sentences for mother tongue
Recent Examples of Synonyms for mother tongue
Noun
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Sainz was spoken to by the FIA’s media delegate over his language on Friday morning in Bahrain ahead of opening practice at the Sakhir circuit.—
Luke Smith,
New York Times,
11 Apr. 2025
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The language put Sainz at risk of action from the FIA under its misconduct guidelines, which have a range of potential sanctions for repeat offences including fines, points deductions and race bans.—
Luke Smith,
New York Times,
11 Apr. 2025
Noun
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The examples are countless, and, behind the expansion of vocabulary, there is always a foundation that is likely forgotten or plainly unknown by people who adopt it via popular culture.—
Lawrence Burney,
Pitchfork,
18 Apr. 2025
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For those of us old enough to remember Martin (or caught up through reruns), that phrase is etched into our pop culture vocabulary.—
Angel Diaz,
Billboard,
15 Apr. 2025
Noun
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Like everyone else, the dog starts out in black and white, only for his slurping tongue to gain some Technicolor.—
Chris Jones,
New York Daily News,
8 Apr. 2025
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But more often than not, the sharp tongue and the sly eye roll serve a deeper purpose: survival.—
Shelby Stewart,
Essence,
8 Apr. 2025
Noun
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To prepare, Reid worked with a dialect coach and learned the specific physicality associated with Natalia's condition.—
Lee Habeeb,
MSNBC Newsweek,
4 Apr. 2025
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The interview was conducted in a mixture of English and Low German, a dialect widely spoken within the Christian Mennonite community.—
Thomas G. Moukawsher,
Newsweek,
22 Mar. 2025
Noun
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Ultimately, Andrews and his actors find Chekhov by abandoning the paraphernalia of the writer’s universe and groping, in their own idiom, across a perilously empty stage, toward one another.—
Sara Holdren,
Vulture,
4 Apr. 2025
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Which is fitting for a composer who, even when developing a homegrown idiom of his own, was criticized for sounding too European.—
Joshua Barone,
New York Times,
17 Feb. 2025
Cite this Entry
“Mother tongue.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/mother%20tongue. Accessed 23 Apr. 2025.
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