Metalanguage

Language used to describe another language In logic and linguistics, a metalanguage is a language used to describe another language, often called the object language. Expressions in a metalanguage are often distinguished from those in the object language by the use of italics, quotation marks, or writing on a separate line. For example, to say that the word "noun" can be used as a noun in a sentence, one could write "noun" is a <noun>.[citation needed] A metasyntax is the syntax of a metalanguage which defines the formal grammar of a formal language. Types of metalanguage There are a variety of recognized types of metalanguage, including embedded, ordered, and nested (or hierarchical) metalanguages. Embedded An embedded metalanguage is a language formally, naturally and firmly fixed in an object language. This idea is found in Douglas Hofstadter's book, Gödel, Escher, Bach, in a discussion of the relationship between formal languages and number theory: "... it is in the nature of any formalization of number theory that its metalanguage is embedded within it." It occurs in natural, or informal, languages, as well—such as in English, where words such as noun, verb, or even word de