engleski

Blooming Čakavian lexicography in Croatia as an indicator of dialect erosion and loss

Dialect lexicography has been flourishing in Croatia in the last three decades, both as a professional and amateur endeavour. Although there are some dialect dictionaries of Kajkavian and Štokavian dialects, the most of dialect lexicography involves the publication of dictionaries of Čakavian dialects from various parts of Croatia, but mainly from Istria, Adriatic islands and the coast (Lisac, 2006). From 1991 on, around sixty dictionaries of Čakavian dialects have been published in Croatia as a result of purely amateur work, work under a certain degree of supervision by linguists, or work done by professional linguists. At the same time the number of Štokavian and Kajkavian dialect dictionaries appears to be significantly smaller, even though the Čakavian area is geographically the smallest of the three areas on the dialect map of Croatia. An increased interest in dialect dictionary production can be related to the trend of dialect levelling (Britain, 2011 ; Škevin Rajko & Šimičić, 2019) or shift to standard languages (Britain, 2009 ; Smith & Durham, 2011), which is by no means limited to Croatia (see Barbato & Varvaro, 2004), considering the fact that in many parts of the world speakers of local or regional varieties shift to standard languages due to education in the standard language and the modern way of living. This contribution presents a sociolinguistic analysis of contemporary Čakavian lexicography with a special focus on the causes of such an intense activity in preparing and publishing Čakavian dictionaries. It is hypothesized that the reason for such an increase in the number of Čakavian dialect dictionaries is the process of dialect erosion in the Čakavian area, where an increasing number of speakers shift to Standard Croatian. Almost all of the authors state that the purpose of such dictionaries is to record linguistic and cultural heritage, which is in the process of extinction. For the purpose of this analysis, semi-structured interviews will be conducted with a number of authors of the mentioned dialect dictionaries, as well as with representatives of “Matica hrvatska”, one of the most productive publishers of dialect dictionaries (cf. Fatović, 2017 ; Gagić, 2017 ; Oštarić, 2005 ; Piasevoli, 1993 ; Radulić, 2002 ; Vranić & Oštarić, 2016). In addition, this contribution will also present the findings of a discourse analysis of forewords and introductory texts of dialect dictionaries in which the authors state the reasons and motivations for their lexicographic work. The combination of those two data sources will give us an insight into the causes of this live lexicographic activity and, indirectly, into the perceived existence of dialect erosion in the Čakavian dialect area.

Čakavian, lexicography, dialect levelling, dialect erosion,

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