Meanings
plural second languages
- A language that is spoken by someone but is not their mother tongue.
My second languages are Italian and German.
2 more examples
Vocabulary is a vital component of educational success in both first and second language contexts.
2018, Clarence Green, James Lambert, “Advancing disciplinary literacy through English for academic purposes: Discipline-specific wordlists, collocations and word families for eight secondary subjects”, in Journal of English for Academic Purposes, volume 35, →DOI, page 105Malay is the lingua franca of several Southeast Asia countries and has been simplified by its use as a second language by non-native speakers. For example, the Malay plural is formed by repeating a word twice – buku means book and buku-buku means books.
2021 April 25, John Malathronas, “Which languages are easiest – and most difficult – for native English speakers to learn?”, in CNN, archived from the original on 22 Mar 2022
Synonyms & antonyms
nouna language that a person has acquired in adolescence or later
Synonym sets from Open English WordNet, CC BY 4.0.
Translations
Chinese Mandarin 第二語言 /第二语言, 外語 /外语
- 第二語言 /第二语言 (dì-èr yǔyán)language spoken other than the mother tongue
- 外語 /外语 (wàiyǔ)language spoken other than the mother tongue
Finnish toinen kieli, muu kieli
- toinen kielilanguage spoken other than the mother tongue
- muu kielilanguage spoken other than the mother tongue
French seconde langue
- seconde languelanguage spoken other than the mother tongue
German Zweitsprache
- Zweitsprachelanguage spoken other than the mother tongue
Indonesian bahasa kedua
- bahasa kedualanguage spoken other than the mother tongue
Norwegian Bokmål andrespråk
- andrespråklanguage spoken other than the mother tongue
Polish język obcy
- język obcylanguage spoken other than the mother tongue
Portuguese segunda língua
- segunda língualanguage spoken other than the mother tongue
Swedish andraspråk
- andraspråklanguage spoken other than the mother tongue
Cite this entry
second language. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 2, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/second%20language
“second language.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/second%20language. Accessed November 2, 2026.
WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “second language,” accessed November 2, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/second%20language.
Source: second language on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.