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
Image The theme is the conflict between mother tongues and other tongues.
—
Jesse Green, New York Times, 24 Jan. 2025
Yiddish, the mother tongue of Ashkenazi Jews in Europe for nearly a thousand years, is still spoken by about six hundred thousand ultra-Orthodox Jews mostly concentrated in America, Europe, and Israel.
—Adam Kirsch, The New Yorker, 21 Mar. 2025
So to be able to play in my mother tongue would be an amazing experience because there would be no boundaries whatsoever.
—Todd Gilchrist, Variety, 18 Mar. 2025
So to be able to play in my mother tongue would be an amazing experience because there would be no boundaries whatsoever.
—Todd Gilchrist, Variety, 18 Mar. 2025
See All Example Sentences for mother tongue
Jesse Green, New York Times, 24 Jan. 2025
Yiddish, the mother tongue of Ashkenazi Jews in Europe for nearly a thousand years, is still spoken by about six hundred thousand ultra-Orthodox Jews mostly concentrated in America, Europe, and Israel.
—Adam Kirsch, The New Yorker, 21 Mar. 2025
So to be able to play in my mother tongue would be an amazing experience because there would be no boundaries whatsoever.
—Todd Gilchrist, Variety, 18 Mar. 2025
So to be able to play in my mother tongue would be an amazing experience because there would be no boundaries whatsoever.
—Todd Gilchrist, Variety, 18 Mar. 2025
See All Example Sentences for mother tongue
Recent Examples of Synonyms for mother tongue
Noun
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The money, which was used to found a range of initiatives including teacher training and English language programs, was suspended by the Trump administration on June 30 pending a review by the federal Office of Management and Budget.—
James Bickerton,
MSNBC Newsweek,
26 July 2025
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Barring any specific language in the Wilkins contract, the Raiders will have an uphill battle to fight.—
Saad Yousuf,
New York Times,
26 July 2025
Noun
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One obvious benefit of Flett and Hewitt’s approach has been to give people a vocabulary and a framework for understanding an important thread running through a variety of conditions.—
Leslie Jamison,
New Yorker,
4 Aug. 2025
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Children may have less height, vocabulary, and power than adults do.—
Philip Nel
July 28,
Literary Hub,
28 July 2025
Noun
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Pat Daniels — played by real-life sportscaster Dan Patrick — appears in the mid-credits scene to report that the Maxi golf league failed and that their sports drink was recalled after being found to cause halitosis, gingivitis and tongue rot.—
Skyler Trepel,
People.com,
29 July 2025
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Practitioners read the pulse, the tongue, the skin and the breath to assess how energy was flowing in the system.—
Trisha Swift,
Forbes.com,
28 July 2025
Noun
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While over 20 dialects are spoken in Liberia, English is the official language of the country.—
Jenny Goldsberry,
The Washington Examiner,
10 July 2025
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Look for loot and get a glimpse of life in the historic Marolles district south of the city center, once famous for the increasingly rare local dialect, Brusseleer, a.k.a.—
New York Times,
New York Times,
10 July 2025
Noun
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To quote a homespun idiom, there are different horses for different courses.—
PC Magazine,
PC Magazine,
23 July 2025
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Especially in multilingual markets, users frequently mix languages and use non-standard grammar, local idioms, creative spelling and hybrid sentence structures.—
Alessa Cross,
Forbes.com,
11 June 2025
Cite this Entry
“Mother tongue.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/mother%20tongue. Accessed 7 Aug. 2025.
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