Meanings
- uncountablebiologyThe evolution of a mimic to resemble its model more closely.
- uncountablehuman sciencesThe evolution of a dialect to resemble the standard language more closely.
The main process in regiolect formation is dialect-to-standard advergence, but there are two caveats to this statement.
2005, Nicole Delbecque, Johan van der Auwera, Dirk Geeraerts, Perspectives on Variation, page 251 more example
Horizontal convergence that causes divergence in a part of a formerly uniform dialect area can be, and often is, accompanied by vertical convergence, i.e., by advergence to the standard language.
2010, Peter Auer, Jürgen Erich Schmidt, Theories and Methods, page 290
Origin
- Latinvergere“to turn, incline”
- Englishadvergence
Coined by evolutionary biologists L. P. Brower and J. van Z. Brower in 1972 for the paper "Parallelism, convergence, divergence, and the new concept of advergence in the evolution of mimicry" on the pattern of convergence, substituting ad- for con- to emphasize the one-sidedness of the approach. Borrowed into linguistics by Peter Auer in 1998. By surface analysis, ad- + verge + -ence, from Latin vergere (“to turn, incline”), from Proto-Italic *wergō, from Proto-Indo-European *h₂wérg-e-ti, from *h₂werg- (“to turn”).
More words from Latin
Full word history & related roots →Cite this entry
advergence. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 3, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/advergence
“advergence.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/advergence. Accessed November 3, 2026.
WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “advergence,” accessed November 3, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/advergence.
Source: advergence on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.