Assessing the impact of English abbreviations on the Italian language: A discussion based on the forms, frequency and functions of USA in written texts

Abstract

The goal of this paper is to assess the impact of English on the structures of contemporary Italian by focusing on the use of abbreviations, a phenomenon that is usually not taken into account systematically when dealing with anglicisms used in Italian. Specifically, the paper is devoted to the abbreviation USA, which is a commonly occurring form in contemporary Italian functioning as both a noun and an adjective. On the basis of different corpora of written texts, the paper offers insights into the forms, frequency, morpho-syntactic and pragmatic functions of the abbreviation USA, discusses to what extent this abbreviation competes with alternative forms (Stati Uniti, americano etc.) and highlights the process that led to its use as an adjective. In the conclusion, important descriptive and theoretical implications of our findings are presented.