engleski

The Struggle to maintain Croatian Dialects in the U.S.

The focus of the author's studies is: direct borrowing in the bilingual situation of Croatian Americans in the U.S. under the influence of the language of prestige (AE) and social pressure, the dialect runs the risk of becoming so much assimilated that it becomes changed beyond recognition and finally lost. Study of the sociology of Croatian Americans lets me determine the degree of bilingualism and the kind and extent of AE influence on their speech. For any research of this kind, it is necessary and recommendable a) to determine the areas and communities of CA's whose dialects we want to record and describe; 2) to establish the psychology and sociology of the language contact occuring in their bilingual situation; 3) to observe the struggle to maintain the dialects; and 4) to develop a method of field work based on the concept of bilingual dialect. in my project "Croatian dialects in the U.S.", I have followed these principles, and the results so far achieved have proved the theory and method to be satisfactory.

Croatian dialects, direct borrowing, bilingual situation, Croatian Americans, language of prestige, American English, language contact, bilingual dialect

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