metalanguage

meta- +‎ language

• Audio (UK)

  (file)

metalanguage (countable and uncountable, plural metalanguages)

1. (linguistics, translation studies, critical theory) Any language or vocabulary of specialized terms used to describe or analyze a language or linguistic process
   • 2005, Michael Cronin, edited by Martha Tennent and Benjamins Translation Library, Training for the New Millennium: Pedagogies for translation and interpreting, page 255:

     In order to talk or theorise about phenomena, one inevitably uses a language that is in effect a metalanguage, a special instance of language that allows the theorist to stand back and describe what is happening.

2. (computing) Any similar language used to define a programming language

• object language
• epilanguage