Cronodiatopia sarda

VIRDIS, MAURIZIO

2014-01-01

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Abstract

The fundamental diatopic subdivision of the Sardinian linguistic space is usually explained with a larger conservatism of the northern and central territories compared to the southern ones, always considered more exposed to external influences, from a historic and geographical point of view. Such a way of interpreting the diatopy of Sardinian, is often due to a pre-scientific and rhetorical old ‘prejudice’, according to which the northern dialects are more resistant to the external influences , and therefore closer to Latin and more conservative. However, a more careful and flexible consideration of the linguistic data, in a historical sociolinguistics perspective, could make us reconsider the diachrony and diatopy of Sardinian language in a new way. Hence, several conservative linguistic facts of the northern territories can be considered not just conservative and archaic, but the result of a selection of diaphasic and diastratic variants related to the Latin 'standard', which is often a more recent standard.