ELL: Re: Sardo language and culture

[Alberto Mario DeLogu]

One of the tentative projects of the Circolo Sardegna Unita (an Association
of Sardinians in Toronto, Canada) for this fall is a course in Sardinian
culture and language.
The Italian Parliament has just recently (about 4 years ago) passed a law on
minority languages, and "Sardo" was one of those languages deemed worthy of
active protection and support.
Sardo is one of the oldest languages of the Mediterranean basin, its makeup
being a melange of ancient Latin (Sardo is the closest living language to
the tongue ancient Romans spoke!), Carthaginian-Phoenician, Arabic, Spanish,
Italian and pre-historical Sardo.
The Italianization of Sardinia has gained speed over the last 30 years, and
most Sardinians are now fully bilingual as they now speak Italian in school
and in the workplace but would revert to one of the many (5 to 10) Sardinian
dialects when in the family and on more informal social occasions. The use
of Sardo in everyday's life is considerably more widespread in rural
communities than in the cities, where we have a young generation of
monolingual Italian speakers with very little exposure to the Sardinian
culture and native languages.
Too often regarded as the language of rural destitution and poverty, Sardo
was too hastily forsaken by many urbanized Sardinians who raised
Italian-speaking children, thus severing their ties with a language which
brought to mind a personal history they only wanted to leave behind.
However, consensus and support for the defence and the support of the Sardo
language is growing rapidly even amongst the youth, as a way of defending
and establishing their identity next to (but not against) the Italian one.
This new call for an active defence of the Sardo language is even more
popular and heartfelt now that even the Italian language is slowly losing
ground to the Anglicization of the media and the internet (this posting
being a case in point!).
The Sardo community throughout the world plays an active role in fostering
the advancement of its native culture and language, sometimes even against
the lenient attitude Sardinia politicians, media and maitres-a-penser
exhibit on the issue.
Sardo is still an endangered language, but we also feel that its swansong is
yet to come: we Sardinian "emigrees" are deeply committed to endorsing and
promoting it in and out with the Island.

-Alberto Mario DeLogu
amdelogu at sprint.ca

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