This article aims to describe the sociolinguistic situation of two Italian-speaking communities in Santa Catarina. It presents a sociolinguistic panorama of Nova Trento and Nova Veneza from the 19th century, emphasizing the most important aspects of the history of Italian immigrants in Brazil, as well as the main factors that affected the use of Italian language varieties, and residents’ views and attitudes regarding the languages spoken in this part of southern Brazil. From the beginning of Italian immigration to Brazil the immigrants experienced different historical circumstances that have led to the current state of their dialects, mainly the dictatorship of Getúlio Vargas. But after almost one hundred and fifty years the dialects are still spoken and they have become part of the Brazilian cultural heritage.