Italian For Dummies (eBook)

Giuseppe Cavatorta, Teresa L. Picarazzi (Autoren)

eBook Download: EPUB

2025 | 3. Auflage
516 Seiten
For Dummies (Verlag)
978-1-394-32147-6 (ISBN)

Infos

The Dummies language learning method makes it easy to speak Italiano

Italian For Dummies is your quick-start guide to the Italian language. It offers friendly and clear instruction on Italian grammar and pronunciation, and even some cultural background to spice things up. You'll also get ample practice opportunities, so you can quickly build your skill in conversational Italian. Traveling to an Italian-speaking country? This book has you covered, with useful travel phrases and a guide to the common words and expressions you're likely to hear. With a mini-dictionary and other helpful resources, Italian For Dummies will show you why Dummies language guides are popular with students and travelers alike.

• Learn the basics of Italian grammar and start speaking the language right away
• Prepare to travel to Italian-speaking countries for work, school, or pleasure
• Work through authentic conversations in Italian to learn how the language is really spoken, plus follow along with online audio
• Master Italian pronunciation so you can communicate effectively

For anyone wanting to grasp the basics of conversational Italian-even if you have no prior experience-Italian For Dummies will get you started with this beautiful language.

Giuseppe Cavatorta, PhD, is a professor of Italian at the University of Arizona. He has written, edited, and translated several works across disciplines focusing mainly on Italian and American poetry.

Teresa L. Picarazzi, PhD, has taught Italian language, literature, and cinema for more than 20 years. She's also written several For Dummies books, including Italian Workbook For Dummies.

Textauszug

Chapter 1

Saying Italian Like It Is

IN THIS CHAPTER

Discovering Italian you already know

Using basic expressions to get you by and cognates

Introducing basic Italian pronunciation

You probably know that Italian is a Romance language, which means that Italian, just like Spanish, French, Portuguese, and some other languages, is a “child” of Latin. There was a time when Latin was the official language in a large part of Europe because the Romans ruled so much of the area. Before the Romans came, people spoke their own languages, and the mixture of these original tongues with Latin produced many of the languages and dialects still in use today.

If you know one of these Romance languages, you can often understand parts of another. But just as members of the same family can look very similar but have totally different personalities, so it is with these languages. People in different areas speak in very different ways due to historical or social reasons, and even though Italian is the official language, Italy has a rich variety of dialects. Some dialects differ so much from standard Italian that people from different regions can’t understand each other.

Despite the number of different accents and dialects, you’ll be happy to discover that everybody understands the Italian you speak and you’ll understand theirs. (Italians don’t usually speak in their dialect with people outside their region.) This chapter introduces you to the world of Italian.

You Already Know Some Italian!

Although Italians are very proud of their language, they have allowed some English words such as gadget, jogging, weekend, and shock to enter it. They often use the word okay, and since computers have entered their lives, they say “cliccare sul mouse” (kleek-kah-reh soohl mouse) (to click the mouse). Finally, there’s lo zapping (loh zapping), which means continuously switching TV channels with the remote. These are only a few of the flood of English words that have entered the Italian language.

In the same way, many Italian words are known in English-speaking countries. Can you think of some? Consider the following words:

• pizza (peet-tsah)
• pasta (pah-stah)
• spaghetti (spah-geht-tee)
• tortellini (tohr-tehl-lee-nee)
• mozzarella (moht-tsah-rehl-lah)
• espresso (eh-sprehs-soh)
• cappuccino (kahp-pooh-chee-noh)
• panino (pah-nee-noh): For one sandwich: for two or more, the word is panini (pah-nee-nee)
• biscotti (bee-skoht-tee) (cookies): One cookie is a biscotto (bee-skoht-toh)
• tiramisù (tee-rah-mee-sooh)

Incidentally, did you know that tiramisù literally means pull me up? The name comes from the boost of energy you get from the strong Italian espresso and eggs in it. You may have heard words not directly related to food, such as the following:

• amore (ah-moh-reh): This is the word for love that so many Italian songs talk about.
• avanti (ah-vahn-tee): You use this word as come in!, come on!, or get a move on!
• bambino (bahm-bee-noh): This means child or boy. The word for girl is bambina (bahm-bee-nah).
• bravo! (brah-voh): Say this to a man. For a woman, use brava! (brah-vah), and for a group, bravi! (brah-vee) or brave! (brah-veh) if it’s all women.
• ciao! (chow): Ciao means hello and good-bye.
• scusi (skooh-zee): This word stands for excuse me and sorry and is addressed to persons you don’t know or to whom you speak formally. You say “scusa” (skooh-zah) to people you know and to children.

You’ve heard at least some of these words, haven’t you? This is just a little taste of all the various words and expressions you’ll get to know in this book.

Cognates

In addition to the words that have crept into the language directly, Italian and English have many cognates. A cognate is a word in one language that has the same origin as a word in another one and may sound similar. The following words can give you an immediate sense of what cognates are:

• aeroporto (ah-eh-roh-pohr-toh) (airport)
• attenzione (aht-tehn-tsyoh-neh) (attention)
• comunicazione (koh-mooh-nee-kah-tsyoh-neh) (communication)
• importante (eem-pohr-tahn-teh) (important)
• incredibile (een-kreh-dee-bee-leh) (incredible)

You understand much more Italian than you think you do. Italian and English are full of cognates. To demonstrate, read this little story with some Italian words and see how easy it is for you to understand.

It seems impossibile (eem-pohs-see-bee-leh) to him that he is now at the aeroporto (ah-eh-roh-pohr-toh) in Rome. When he goes out on the street, he first calls a taxi (tah-ksee). He opens his bag to see if he has the medicine (meh-dee-chee-neh) that the dottore (doht-toh-reh) prescribed for him. Going through this terribile traffico (tehr-ree-bee-leh trahf-fee-koh), he passes a cattedrale (kaht-teh-drah-leh), some monumenti (moh-nooh-mehn-tee), and many palazzi (pah-laht-tsee). He knows that this is going to be a fantastico (fahn-tah-stee-koh) journey.

Sounding Italian: The Essentials

Italian gives your tongue plenty of chances to do acrobatics — and that’s part of the fun. The language introduces you to some new and exciting sounds. In this section, we walk you through some basic pronunciation guidelines to help you speak Italian like a native speaker.

Throughout this book, you find the pronunciation of Italian words in parentheses. The next few sections contain helpful hints on how to read and use these pronunciations — in other words, how to pronounce Italian words. Here’s the deal: We need to agree on what letters stand for which sounds, so stick with this pronunciation code as you go through the book.

In the pronunciations, we separate the syllables with a hyphen, like this: casa (kah-zah) (house). The stressed syllable, that is, the part of the word where you place the emphasis is italicized. If you acquire the correct pronunciation, starting with the alphabet, you may even be able to forgo the pronunciation spelling provided, and read it like a real Italian.

The alphabet

What better way is there to start speaking a language than to familiarize yourself with its alphabet! Table 1-1 shows you all the letters as well as how each of them sounds. It’s essential to learn how to pronounce the Italian alphabet so that you’ll be able to pronounce all of the new words you will be learning. Listen to and repeat what you hear in Track 1 of the audio files as many times as you need to in order to get down the right sounds. In the long run, this will help you be understood when you communicate in Italian. Note that there are only 21 letters in the Italian alphabet: Missing are j, k, w, x, and y (which have crept into some Italian words).

TABLE 1-1 The Italian Alphabet (ahl-fah-beh-toh)

Letter	Pronunciation	Letter	Pronunciation

a

ah

b

bee

c

chee

d

dee

e

eh

f

ehf-feh

g

jee

h

ahk-kah

i

ee

j

ee...

Produkt-Details

• Erscheint lt. Verlag: 6.10.2025
• Sprache: englisch
• Themenwelt: Schulbuch / Wörterbuch ► Wörterbuch / Fremdsprachen
• Themenwelt: Geisteswissenschaften ► Sprach- / Literaturwissenschaft ► Sprachwissenschaft
• Themenwelt: Technik
• Schlagworte: books on Italian language • Italian • italian beginners • Italian dictionary and phrasebook • Italian language • italian learning • italian phrases • Italy trip essentials • learn italian • speak italian • travel essentials Italy • travel Italy • trip to Italy
• ISBN-10: 1-394-32147-3 / 1394321473
• ISBN-13: 978-1-394-32147-6 / 9781394321476