Italian is Windsor’s third language… Italian is spoken at home by 6,075 people, which makes it the second most common language. Nearly half of the 12,640 Windsor-area people who say Italian is their mother tongue speak it at home. Most Italians speak regional dialects, and most often the language of communication among Italians of different regions and with their Canadian born children is English rather than standard Italian. (Walter Temelini, The Italian cultural presence in Windsor, 1920-1990.)

The Italian speaking community has been a linguistics case study of the adaptation of the community to the new environment. It shows how a language is able to change according to the outside factors of the environment.

Italians have used their mother tongue in their ethnic community and especially in their families. The Canadian version of Italian is referred to in studies as an “ethnolect”. When the ethnolect and the primary, dominant language are in contact , the first one borrows words. The process is known by the term loanwords. This process had happened to the first generation of immigrants. As they adapted to a new life, the social-cultural factors of the new environment resulted in a new way of speaking the language.

The vocabulary used by the family refers to everyday life. As this vocabulary is used throughout the community, adjustments are made to the pronunciation and the grammar. This process is called nativization.