Convergence and Attrition: Serbian in Contact with English in Australia

Abstract

The aim of this paper is to examine features resulting from language contact under conditions of language shift in a variety of Serbian spoken in a migrant community in Melbourne, Australia. Three categories of change are proposed: (i) change that makes Serbian more similar to English without simplifying it, exemplified by the resetting of the pro -drop parameter; (ii) change that simplifies the structures of Serbian without making them more similar to English, exemplified by leveling within the verbal inflectional paradigm and dropping of the 3sg auxiliary clitic je; and (iii) change that both simplifies the structures of Serbian and makes them more like English, exemplified by leveling within the nominal inflectional paradigm, use of full pronominal forms following the verb rather than clitic pronominal forms in second position, and placement of verbal auxiliary clitics and the reflexive clitic se.