doculect

Blend of document +‎ -lect, coined by American linguist Jeff Good in 2006.

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ˈdɒkjʊlɛkt/, /ˈdɒkjəlɛkt/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /ˈdɑkjulɛkt/, /ˈdɑkjəlɛkt/

doculect (plural doculects)

1. (linguistics) The lect (language variety) of a particular document.
   • 2012, Andrea Ender, Adrian Leemann, Bernhard Wälchli, Methods in Contemporary Linguistics, →ISBN, page 78:

     This is not the whole explanation why these Mayan doculects have an exceptionally high token frequency, but it explains part of the deviation.

   • 2014, Silvia Luraghi, Heiko Narrog, Perspectives on Semantic Roles, →ISBN, page 26:

     However, for the present study these texts are considered to be specific doculects, which might, or might not, be the 'same' language as described in other resources (e.g. grammars or spontaneous text collections).

   • 2015, Claire Bowern, Linguistic Fieldwork: A Practical Guide, →ISBN, page 100:

     The most extreme case is illustrated by the doculect of McDonald and Wurm (1979), in which their consultant was being interviewed for materials in Garlali, but he preferred to speak Punthamara, so that is what he gave them.

The word was coined for poorly documented languages, now extinct, that are recorded in historical sources. It is used to avoid judgements of whether the language variety of one document can be equated with that of another before a proper comparison can be made, or when a proper comparison cannot be made.

• occulted