Linguistic changes in the Catalan spoken in Catalonia under new contact conditions

Abstract

AbstractLinguistic contact between Catalan and Spanish has undergone substantial change during the last quarter of the twentieth century. A new type of transfer linked to the sociolinguistic changes that have taken place in Catalonia have for the first time after many centuries of contact brought Catalan much closer to Spanish. This article tries to interpret this sudden change in the evolution of modern Catalan by using a model of contact-induced change which takes into account the importance of the agents of change.