Definitions

from The Century Dictionary.

  • Preceding the acquisition of the power of speech; antecedent to the development of language.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • adjective Before learning language.

Etymologies

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

pre- +‎ lingual

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Examples

  • Speaking is difficult for my girls, most especially for Bella who is "prelingual" -- to use Stigma's ridiculous term.

    Kim Stagliano: Stigma Healthcare: Shut Up Kid! 2008

  • Whenever I lip read Brown and listen to/read transcripts of his speeches I'm struck time and again by the contradictions between what Brown says and what his prelingual speech is saying.

    In Praise of Personality Politics Newmania 2008

  • That's why we can find the mirror of modern deaf people's sign language, itself the heir of ancient prelingual forms of communication, in the often holy and sacred, gestures and symbollism of 5000 year old icons and prehistoric art.

    In Praise of Personality Politics Newmania 2008

  • Nowhere is the subconscious force of that swirling primodial soup more evident in us than in our gestures and body language: the traces and cyphers of our subconcious, prelingual and primordial past and present.

    In Praise of Personality Politics Newmania 2008

  • Then one of the younger males jeered, urging the challenging male on—in their prelingual word-sounds, questioning the young male's courage and his maleness.

    TRIANGLE SONDRA MARSHAK 2009

  • At Rutgers University in Newark, N.J., neuroscientist April Benasich fits prelingual babies with caps that read electrical activity in the brain.

    Time - The Art of Simplexity William Harryman 2009

  • Then one of the younger males jeered, urging the challenging male on—in their prelingual word-sounds, questioning the young male's courage and his maleness.

    TRIANGLE SONDRA MARSHAK 2009

  • Then one of the younger males jeered, urging the challenging male on—in their prelingual word-sounds, questioning the young male's courage and his maleness.

    TRIANGLE SONDRA MARSHAK 2009

  • Speech therapy is generally not appropriate for use in prelingual children when there is no identified underlying medical condition or there is no possibility of the child reaching an age-appropriate level of speech (e.g., speech therapy for learning disabilities, autism, developmental delay or mental retardation; therapy provided for aversion to food, the inability to construct sentences, stuttering or tongue thrust) (Johnson, 2005; Bressmann, 2005; Kroll, 2005).

    Kim Stagliano: Stigma Healthcare: Shut Up Kid! 2008

  • Genetic analysis of an inbred Pakistani family PKDF280, segregating prelingual severe to profound sensorineural hearing loss, provided evidence for a

    Naturejobs - All Jobs Shahid Yar Khan 2009

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