On the basis of 30 years of following the linguistic situation in smaller urban centres on the mainland and islands in the northern Croatian Adriatic (Mošćenice on the mainland, and Cres, Veli Lošinj, Mali Lošinj and Osor on the islands), in this paper we analyse tendencies that are in many respects similar to those in the “big” cities. Our observations are supported by a comparison of data on dialects of these small towns from the period when they still had the status of dialect points that can be found in the literature and the results of recent field research conducted by the authors. We also analyse linguistic tendencies in these areas. |