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Language by distance (German Abstandsprache), language by development (tyska Ausbausprache) och roof language (tyska Dachsprache) are three sociolinguistic concepts. They were created by Heinz Kloss to contribute to solving the problem of determining whether a language variety is a language or a dialect.

An abstandsprache is a spoken language (or a group of dialects) that is seen to be a language because it is impossible to make oneself understood to outsiders using that language variety.

An ausbausprache is seen to be a language because is it has become a standardised writen and spoken language, and is used in all private and public sphere, often in a whole country. An ausbausprache is not necessarily difficult to understand to spekaers of other languages.

A dachsprache is a standard language. It is used in some public spheres by groups of people who privately speak dialekts that are related to each other and to the dachsprache. The dialekt have loser status and no or limited use i writing.

The point of the terminology is:
 * that a language variety may be labelled as a language in the sense ausbausprache even if it is not a abstandsprache, and vice versa that that a distinct dialect may be labelled as a language (an abstand-language) even if it is not ausgebaut – developed into an aubaulanguage, and that
 * that related language varieties, that are hardly mutually intelligible, can be considered to be the same language if they have a common dachsprache.

Background
It is debated in linguistics what the criteria for a distinct language should be. Mutual intelligibility between any two linguistic varieties varies from zero to almost 100 per cent, and speakers harbour ideological notions about language. Heins Kloss approached the problem of demarcating languages from a sociological perspective rather than a purely linguistic perspective. He created the concepts abstandsprache and ausbausprach, ans also coined the words. Heinz Kloss also began the thinking about dachsprache, but the word was probaly first used in print by some other linguist, possibly Hans Goelb.

Abstandsprache
An abstandsprache is a variety (or group of dialects) that reasonably must be considered a distinkt language purely on the basis of (lack of) mutual intelligibility with other spoken languages. If the abstand (meaning “distance” in a non-geographic sense) of the vernacular to other vernaculars is sufficeinetly grat to hinder communication, the variety is considered to be a abstandsprache

Th isolate Basque is an abstandsprache that has been spoken in Europe since the stone age; relatives of Basque must have been supplanted by unrelated later arrivals to Western Europe in prehistoric times.

Speakers of divergent Basque dialects may have difficulty communicating. However, the Basque chain of dialects constitute an abstandsprache in relation to non-Basque languages. Heinz Kloss theory does not claim to solve the linguistic problem of demarcating one abstandsprache from another; it merely adds a sociological perspective by introducing the term ausbausprache.

Ausbausprache
If a language is considered to be a language because it has been cultivated and standardised, and perhaps has become the languages of a state, then it is an ausbausprache. Ausbausprache have standardised grammar and orthography, often a standard pronunciation, and a larger vocabulary than non-ausbausprache'' have.

All spoken languages, including contact languages such as tok pisin can become ausbausprache if they used in writing and education.

Comparison of abstandsprache and ausbausprache
Abstandsprache is contrasted with ausbausprache. Abstandsprache is primarily a linguistic concept; ausbausprache is a sociological concept.

A language can be both an absandsprache and a ausbausprache. English has considerable abstand to its closest relatives, and is a very ausgebaut (developed) language.

Dachsprache
A dachsprache is an ausbausprache that functions as a common standard language for a number dialects that are related to each other and the dachsprache''. A dachsprache is by definition an ausbausprache.

An abstandsprache is not necessarily roofed by a dachsprache The use of a dachsprache can also be described as a example of diglossia. Note however that the term ”diglossia” has developed to include cases where the low and high languages are not related.

Kloss’s terminology as partial solution to the dialect/language problem
Kloss’s is a partial solution to the dialect/language problem. Using Kloss’s model one is not forced to classify a variety as a language or a dialect of a larger language. Swedish and Norwegian, for example, are ausbausprache, but not abstandsprache. Together they form an abstandspreche relative to related languages such as Dutch.

Kloss’s model is also applicable to cases such as Arabic. Dialects of Arabic are often called “languages” because they are hardly mutually intelligible. But the Arabic roof language preserves the social unity of Arabic, while full recognition is given to the linguistic status of dialects as abstandsprache

Application of the concept of dachsprache
One of the most important surveys of languages is Ethnologue, which is based on the ISO 639&#x2011;3 standard. Both are maintained by SIL International. The lates version of Ethnologue has macrolanguages”, which corresponds to Dachsprache.

Comparison with the concept language variety
Onother solution to the dialect/language problem is to introduce the term language variety. Every distict form of language that is distinguished by speakers or linguists is called a variety, and no judgment is made whether a variety is a language or a dialect. This terminology avoids the words “language” and “dialect”, but it “flattens” and obscures the sociolinguistic structure of language systems.