Language Acquisition in an Italian-Czech Bilingual Family with Two Children

This diploma thesis examines the simultaneous acquisition of Czech and Italian in two siblings growing up in a Czech-Italian family in the Czech Republic. It combines a theoretical discussion of changing perspectives on bilingualism and on the assessment ofbilingualchildren withanempiricalcase study. The empiricalparttriangulates parental background information, structured language tasks, and analyses of authentic recordings of family interaction. The analyses address language choice by addressee and communicative domain, the functions of code-switching and code-mixing, and developmental profiles in both languages, including narrative abilities (MAIN) and early vocabulary measures MB-CDI instruments. The findings point to a stable bilingual family regime and functional differentiation of the two languages. No signs of language delay are observed; asymmetries align with differences in exposure and communicative opportunities.