CODE-SWITCHING, BORROWING, AND LINGUISTIC DILUTION: CONTACT-INDUCED CHANGE IN DAWOODI

Abstract

This paper examines the impact of sustained language contact on Dawoodi, focusing on patterns of code-switching, lexical borrowing, and structural convergence. Utilizing a corpus-assisted discourse analysis approach, the study analyzes recorded conversations, narrative data, and spontaneous speech samples across generational cohorts within the Dawoodi-speaking community of Mominabad, Hunza. Building on a longitudinal research program that has documented language shift, lexical attrition, structural collapse, and linguistic hegemony in this community (Ishfaq & Bhatti, 2019; 2020; 2021; 2022), the present study examines the contact-induced mechanisms through which these processes unfold at the level of everyday language use. The findings reveal a high frequency of lexical borrowing from Urdu, Burushaski, and Shina, accompanied by phonological and syntactic convergence, particularly among younger speakers. These processes are theorized as forms of linguistic dilution, wherein the structural distinctiveness of Dawoodi is progressively eroded through sustained contact with dominant languages. However, the study resists a purely decrement list interpretation. It argues that code-switching and borrowing also function as adaptive communicative strategies that reflect speakers' navigation of complex multilingual identities and socio-economic realities. The generational variation documented in the data reveals a spectrum from relatively stable borrowing in elder speech to deeply hybridized forms among younger semi-speakers. By situating Dawoodi within broader theoretical debates on language contact, hybridity, and endangerment, the paper contributes to nuanced understanding of contact-induced change as simultaneously adaptive and erosive. It calls for documentation methodologies that capture these dynamic, living processes rather than idealized forms, and for theoretical frameworks that hold the tension between resilience and decline.