ambilingual

ambilingual adjective: speaking two or more languages with complete fluency and such that there is no subject or domain of communication in which one language is preferred over others.

Adjective

ambilingual (not comparable)

Speaking two or more languages with complete fluency and such that there is no subject or domain of communication in which one language is preferred over others.
- The ambilingual poet (as I regard myself) dealing in the transcription of his or her own poetry, though one would assume able to take more liberties, ends up having more trouble in fashioning equivalents.2007, Miguel Gonzalez-Gerth, Looking for the Horse Latitudes, page i
- Some bilingual speakers, including some who are ambilingual, can be said to have two (occasionally more) native languages. There is no exact criterion for this; but one could say arbitrarily that any language learnt by the child before the age of instruction, from parents, from others, such as a...2009, M.A.K. Halliday, Jonathan J. Webster, Language and Society: Volume 10, page 8
Having two languages that are used for any and all communications, where neither language is dominant.
- When two languages in a territory function for the same people and both can be used officially and at the dialect level we have what is called an ambilingual situation.1978, Joshua A. Fishman, Advances in the study of societal multilingualism, page 390
- In a typical ambilingual area it is nearly impossible to tell which language is used when in a given settings.2007, Chris U. Agbedo, Problems of Multilingual Nations: The Nigerian Perspective, page 15

Noun

ambilingual (plural ambilinguals)

A person who is ambilingual.
- Although he comes very near to being an ambilingual in that he can read, write, understand and speak equally well in French and English, his attempts to translate one of his own books led to failure.1986, Hugo Baetens Beardsmore, Bilingualism: Basic Principles, page 8
- True ambilinguals are said to be rare, since most people capable of speaking two languages 'restrict at least one of their languages to ceratin uses: and in any given use, one or the other language tends to predominate.'1986, Francis Britto, Diglossia: A Study of the Theory With Application to Tamil, page 296

ambilingual meaning in Tamil

ambilingual in Tamil

நிகர் இருமொழியர்

Examples of ambilingual in a sentence

Some bilingual speakers, including some who are ambilingual, can be said to have two (occasionally more) native languages.2009, M.A.K. Halliday, Jonathan J. Webster, Language and Society: Volume 10, page 8:
But true ambilingual speakers are rare as most of the bilingual speakers restrict at least one of their languages to certain uses.2019, Tarni Prasad, A Course in Linguistics, page 230:
We are moving from an ambilingual situation in Catalonia to one where the use of Catalonian is enhanced in public life, cultural activities and work environments.2018, Axel Fleisch, “Colonial legacies and linguistic repertoires in European Amazigh”, in Yolanda Aixelà Cabré, editor, In the Footsteps...

Forms of ambilingual

plural	ambilinguals

Origin of ambilingual

From ambi- + lingual.

Words formed from ambilingual

ambilingualism

Words that rhyme with ambilingual

48 more rhymesFewer rhymes

Questions about ambilingual

What does ambilingual mean?: Ambilingual means speaking two or more languages with complete fluency and such that there is no subject or domain of communication in which one language is preferred over others.
What is ambilingual in Tamil?: Ambilingual in Tamil is நிகர் இருமொழியர். See Ambilingual meaning in Tamil.
How do you use ambilingual in a sentence?: Some bilingual speakers, including some who are ambilingual, can be said to have two (occasionally more) native languages.
What part of speech is ambilingual?: Ambilingual can be an adjective or a noun.

Words near ambilingual in the dictionary

Adapted from Wiktionary: ambilingual (page history and authors); ambilingual (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

Last updated: 2026-09-02

Cite this entry: “ambilingual.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/ambilingual. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.