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Part of
The Continuity of Linguistic Change: Selected papers in honour of Juan Andrés Villena-Ponsoda
Edited by Matilde Vida-Castro and Antonio Manuel Ávila-Muñoz
[Studies in Language Variation 31] 2024
► pp. 164–182

Chapter 8
After dialectalisation

An overview of ongoing processes of convergence in Italian

| University of Turin , Italy

This paper provides an overview of ongoing processes of convergence in the Italian language. It focuses on regional varieties of Italian, which essentially are the result of the so-called dialectalisation of the standard language and are nowadays affected by extensive processes of vertical and horizontal convergence. It considers the “downward” convergence of the standard usage towards sub-standard varieties, the “upward” convergence of sub-standard varieties towards the standard usage, and the supra-regional use, i.e. “horizontal” diffusion, of linguistic features originally confined to distinct geographic areas. The overall picture suggests that differences persist between regional varieties of Italian, though they are becoming increasingly less pronounced.

Keywords: Italian, Italo-Romance dialects, regional variation, vertical convergence, horizontal convergence
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Italian and Italo-Romance dialects
  • 3.Vertical convergence
  • 4.Horizontal convergence
  • 5.Conclusions
  • Notes
  • References
Published online: 5 February 2024
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/silv.31.08cer
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