The impact of the English language in Italy

This book offers a detailed account of the impact that contact with the English language has had on Italian language and society. The first chapter places the Italian case within the current sociolinguistic and language policy debates on the spread of English as a global language. The following chapters focus on how English influences have contributed to the historical development of certain grammatical structures of the Italian language, from phonology to word-formation and syntax. Finally, Chapter 5 turns to lexical influence in order to assess the specific contribution of American English, as opposed to other varieties of English. The book as a whole shows how the impact of English on the history of the Italian language is linked to the social stratifications and hierarchies of prestige and power within the community that uses Italian, and how these hierarchies and stratifications are in turn affected by the spread of English. ISBN 9783862888795. LINCOM Studies in Sociolinguistics 16. 136pp. 2018.