engleski

Morphological adaptation of romance nouns in Dalmatian speech

Linguistic influences of Romance languages in Dalmatian dialects have played very important roles. In some periods, the complete coexistence of Slavonic and Romance inhabitants may be observed. Because of geographic proximity and economic and cultural contacts, the linguistic influence from the Italian speaking area has not been interrupted to the present. Following the principals of contact linguistics, the theoretical approach and terminology has been based on the theory of languages in contact. The methods of the adaptations of nouns of Romance origin (this primarily refers to nouns borrowed from the Venetian language, standard Italian language and various North-Italian dialects) in one Slavonic dialect have been discussed and analysed. The main aim of this paper is to estimate the actuality of the nouns of Romance origin and identify the modifications which developed in the process of their adaptation in the speech of Split, Croatia. Languages in contact rarely influence each other in morphology, on the contrary, foreign elements usually adapt to the morphological system of the receiving language. After adaptation at the phonological level, the substitution of Romance elements at the morphological level is called transmorphemisation. While analysing the adaptation of nouns of Romance origin or identifying their main form and gender category, three types of transmorphemisation (zero, compromise and complete) have been applied. Morphological adaptation of nouns, besides identifying the basic morphological form, also presupposes identification of gender (masculine tendency, contamination, etc.). Primary and secondary adaptations of nouns at the morphological level have been introduced. During the primary adaptation methods of adaptation of Romance elements into the system of the receiving language have been discussed. During the secondary adaptation, integrated nouns have become the basis for further word formation in the receiving language. Two methods of word formation have been presented: derivation (suffixation and prefixation) and hybridisation.

morphological adaptation ; romance nouns ; Dalmatian speech

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