>
> And of course there's the matter of the term DSL itself, and what it
> connotes (or doesn't).

Nah, not really.
A language is a language.
Film itself is not necessarily a language. Computers are not a  
language either.
A film is a language unto itself, but one that only the director can  
really claim to understand 100%.
A program can be much the same, particularly in C or Perl.

I think DSL is pretty over-used as an acronym like all other acronyms  
that are fashionable in  computerese.
But none-the-less, domain specific language is pretty much best  
described as metaprogramming, where there is some attempt to create a  
programming language or command interface that is for the user within  
specific domain of activity and has functionality that is clearly for  
that domain only. Ideally DSLs should be easier to learn than the  
programming language they're created with.

SQL is probably the best example of a DSL