On disglossia in literature: example of Salvatore Satta’s Il giorno del giudizio

Salvatore Satta’s Il giorno del giudizio is an interesting example of a bilingual novel where co-exist Italian as a dominant or high language and nuorese dialect commonly considered a low language. Sardian language appears in special communicative contests in which Italian results inadequate, despite all its richness and cultural heritage. In the novel relatively few and repetitive words of foreign origin are inserted, and the author involves himself in almost simultaneous translation. Translated words reveal the real possibilities or incapacities of Italian: circumlocutions and synonyms of apparently similar meanings result to be only Platonic shadows, poor reflection of ideal linguistic reality inaccessible for those who use a language different from nuorese. The hierarchy of high-low language is subjected to inversion - a minor, or low language is suitable to express more when it refers to the notions existing only in its particular reality. Any attempt directed to find adequate linguistic analogies between the phenomena of a given social group in a different language results in failure.

On disglossia in literature: example of Salvatore Satta’s Il giorno del giudizio

Salvatore Satta’s Il giorno del giudizio is an interesting example of a bilingual novel where co-exist Italian as a dominant or high language and nuorese dialect commonly considered a low language. Sardian language appears in special communicative contests in which Italian results inadequate, despite all its richness and cultural heritage. In the novel relatively few and repetitive words of foreign origin are inserted, and the author involves himself in almost simultaneous translation. Translated words reveal the real possibilities or incapacities of Italian: circumlocutions and synonyms of apparently similar meanings result to be only Platonic shadows, poor reflection of ideal linguistic reality inaccessible for those who use a language different from nuorese. The hierarchy of high-low language is subjected to inversion - a minor, or low language is suitable to express more when it refers to the notions existing only in its particular reality. Any attempt directed to find adequate linguistic analogies between the phenomena of a given social group in a different language results in failure.