Exploring the History and Decline of Italian Language in the United States

The Decline of Italian Language in the United States

• Italian language has been widely spoken in the United States for over 100 years due to large-scale immigration.
• The number of Italian speakers has seen a steady decline since the 1980s due to assimilation and integration into American society.
• Italian is currently the eighth most spoken language in the country.
• The first Italian Americans began to immigrate en masse around 1880, and between 1820 and 1978, some 5.3 million Italians went to the United States.
• During World War Two, use of Italian languages in the U.S. was discouraged.
• Today, 15,638,348 American residents report themselves as Italian Americans, and about 708,966 of these report speaking Italian at home.
• Assimilation has played a large role in the decreasing number of Italian speakers today.
• Despite being the fifth most studied language in higher education settings throughout America, the Italian language has struggled to maintain being an AP course of study in high schools nationwide.
• Organizations such as the National Italian American Foundation (NIAF) and Order Sons of Italy in America conducted fundraising campaigns to revive the course of study.
• Other Italo-Dalmatian languages spoken by early waves of Italian American immigrants typically did not include Italian but instead included other languages such as Sicilian and Neapolitan.
• Although Italy is a signatory to the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages, it has not ratified the treaty.
• There are still several Italian-only media outlets in the United States.