Learn Italian

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By spuds


I recommend this Learning Italian DVD

Italian 101 (Learn to Speak Italian with The Travel Linguist) Italian 101 (Learn to Speak Italian with The Travel Linguist)
Price: $12.95
List Price: $19.95

Italian, A beautiful language

Italian is a beautiful language. It's a nice one to learn as well. There are plenty of resources out there to help you on your way. Off course I also recommend spending some time in Italy. Nothing like getting to know a language if you spend time with people who speak it. This hub has some good Learning Italian resources for you.


History of Italian

The history of the Italian language is long, but the modern standard of the language was largely shaped by relatively recent events. The earliest surviving texts which can definitely be called Italian (as opposed to its predecessor Vulgar Latin) are legal formulae from the region of Benevento dating from 960-963. Italian was first formalized in the first years of the 14th century through the works of Dante Alighieri, who mixed southern Italian languages, especially Sicilian, with his native Tuscan in his epic poems known collectively as the Commedia, to which Giovanni Boccaccio later affixed the title Divina. Dante's much-loved works were read throughout Italy and his written dialect became the "canonical standard" that others could all understand. Dante is still credited with standardizing the Italian language.

Italian has always had a distinctive dialect for each city, since the cities were until recently thought of as city-states. The most characteristic differences, for instance, between Roman Italian and Milanese Italian are the gemination of inital consonants and the pronunciation of some stressed "e" and some "s" (e.g. va bene ("all right"): a Roman pronounces /va 'bb%u025Bne/, a Milanese /va 'bene/; a casa ("at home"): Roman /a 'kkasa/, Milanese /a 'kaza/).

Some Basic Italian

Italian --- italiano

English --- inglese

Yes --- Sì

No --- No

Hello! --- Ciao (informal) / Salve

How are you? --- Come stai? (informal) / Come sta? (formal)

Good evening! --- Buona sera!

Welcome! --- Prego! (as in "You're Welcome") / Benvenuto! (as in "Welcome to my Home")

Good night! --- Buona notte!

Goodbye! --- Arrivederci! (informal) / Arrivederla (formal)

How many languages can you speak?

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Layne Randolph profile image

Layne Randolph  says:
2 years ago

Great site with lots of information on learning Italian. I speak it too, always trying to improve though. Thanks!

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