Changes in Bilingual Language Choice Influenced by Real and Apparent Time: Panel Study in the Process of Language Shift in a Romanian Minority Community Living in Hungary

“A language shift may be defined as the change from the habitual use of one language to that of another” (Weinreich, 1953: 68). The course and speed of the process of language shift in a bilingual community is greatly influenced by several factors (e.g. social, historical, demographic, linguistic, etc.). Studying the factors influencing the language shift in an indigenous Romanian minority community living in Hungary, we find an extremely complex picture when we examine the factors predicting likely patterns of language maintenance or language shift in a specific community for a specific time period (Borbély, 2002). Since it is impossible to enumerate the exact list of these types of factors, it is an unrealistic goal to fully describe the interplay of the factors applicable for the entire Romanian community. This is even more so since the community is not homogeneous. For instance, every settlement of the Romanian community has different within-group characteristics (e.g. number and proportion of Romanians). At the same time, the examination of these types of factors within one single settlement can be more precise than across the community at large. Such factors as social, economic, political changes of the 20 century affect language maintenance and shift in the entire community probably in the same way. However, a factor like the proportion of Romanians compared to Hungarians in a settlement influences each settlement in a different way. In spite of these obstacles, studying these factors in a given community, we can come closer to estimating the likelihood of continuation, decline or revitalization of the language in any community. The process of language shift in the history of the community has a ‘starting point’ and an ‘endpoint’. Most community studies of the path between these two ‘points’ have been based on linguistic data collected at one time in a specific (indigenous or emigrant) minority community. These studies always focused on synchronic variation in language choice (e.g. Rubin, 1968; Fishman, Cooper and Ma, 1971; Gal, 1979; Kontra, 1990; Bartha, 1993; Li Wei, 1994; Sándor, 1996; Sándor, 2000). Besides other features (style variation, changes in language attitudes, ability of the minority language, identity, loyalty, etc.), changes in the language choice patterns can clearly illustrate the stages/levels in the process of language shift. As Susan Gal pointed out in her book describing the process of language shift in an indigenous Hungarian community of Felsőőr (Oberwart, Austria), “[T]he present differences in language choice between speakers of different ages are a reflection of change over time – of language shift in progress” (Gal, 1979: 153). Li Wei in his book summarizing the language choice and language shift studied in the Tyneside Chinese community states that “[A] number of extra-linguistic factors have been examined and it has been found that age is the most significant factor associated with this change in language choice and language ability”(...). Following this concluding remark, Li Wei did not forget to emphasize that “[H]owever, age alone tells us little about the social mechanisms underlying the language shift process; indeed, it may misleadingly imply that variations in language choice and language ability reflect life-cycle changes rather than changes over time.” (Li Wei, 1994: 114-115).