Please, you journalists save the Italian. Word of prof
Interview by Federico Guiglia with the Italian-Peruvian professor, scholar and translator Gabriele Valle, author of the dictionary "Urgent Italian" in which he collected and described the use of 500 anglicisms translated into Italian.
Merry Christmas and Happy New Year . Without quotes and without translating: it sounds familiar by now, especially these days. Or rather, not familiar: it just sounds understandable.
Since the United Kingdom left the European Union, a paradox has been haunting the Old Continent: English has remained the official language of the EU, but the country that represents it is no longer there. Merry Christmas is a ghost language, yet a dominant one. How do you, after all, communicate between peoples and governments who speak 24 different languages?
To live with catch-all English, the road to multilingual Europe is still long and arduous. Safeguarding one's mother tongue from the siege of the idiom which, especially in the powerful wave of the United States, overflows and drags every national language into itself: this is the problem.
Already the author of the reasoned dictionary "Italiano Urgente" (Reverdito editore, preface Tullio De Mauro) which collected and recounted the use of 500 anglicisms translated into Italian on the Spanish model, the Italian-Peruvian professor, scholar and translator Gabriele Valle is a pioneer on the topic. Here's how to stop drinking plain English in the delicious Italian language. It is enough to follow the precious examples of the Romance-speaking sister nations, which from France to Spain, from Portugal to Romania always translate the anglicism or adapt it to the phonetics and spelling of their national languages. Far from "stalker", "outfit", "booster", "smart working", "feedback" and so on, humiliating the beautiful language with the typical provincialism of those who know English little and pronounce it worse.
“What Italian do we want to preserve?” asks Professor Valle, who teaches at the Higher School for Linguistic Mediators in Trento. “It is usually the media that dictate linguistic habits. Queen Elizabeth's English changed over time. At the beginning of her reign she expressed herself in an aristocratic manner; ultimately in a medium register, affirmed by state television. Even in Italy, customs are shaped by the information media, which however are affected by a degree of Anglomania without equal in the Latin cosmos. I wrote that, to keep Italian healthy, it would be appropriate to count on the commitment of the State and journalism. I also suggested that there be an institution, like in Spain, that acts as a lightning rod to contain anglicisms. Crusca should perform that function, but it does not always do so promptly. Maybe Treccani or Ansa could do something about it. The Italian speaker is abandoned to his fate."
What could or should we learn from the Real Academia?
“The Spanish Academy works in collaboration with all the academies in the Spanish-speaking world. Implements a pan-Hispanic policy aimed at maintaining the unity of educated Spanish. Faced with anglicisms, it tends to propose substitutes, which are channeled through the Urgent Spanish Counseling Center (Fundéu). Nobody believes in purism anymore, understood as a shield against foreignism. Languages are 'contaminated' by mutual exchange. 'Contamination' is a virtue that enriches them. But the assimilation of foreign voices occurs through translation (skyscraper, from skyscraper ) or adaptation (sheriff, from sheriff ). The Italian has a weak immune system. There is a risk that Itanglish will become the official language!”.
The Accademia della Crusca has been fighting for some time to add among the principles of the Constitution that Italian is the official language of the Republic. Why would it be important to restate the obvious?
“For the same reason that around one hundred and eighty countries in the world have already done so. An official language allows you to establish a promotion and defense policy on a solid basis. Most American republics, in their supreme law, recognize an official language. The Constitution of El Salvador, going further, requires the government to guarantee its conservation and teaching. In Latin Europe each state has an official language. For Spain, all citizens have the duty to know Spanish and the right to express themselves in it. Wise choice, which does not at all affect the linguistic freedom of minorities, whose speech is still protected. But with Italian in the Constitution, a university professor, to request a grant from the ministry to finance a research project, would no longer be forced to apply in English".
Speaking of teachers: the role of the school for the beautiful language?
“The salvation of the Italian passes precisely through the classroom. To preserve it, it would be useful to raise awareness among our schoolchildren in order to create a linguistic awareness that is not frequent in Italy. Language is not a mere tool. It contains a vision of the world shaped by a people. It constitutes its most important spiritual treasure. It may be that, in the future, our young people will consciously and proudly choose to safeguard the rich heritage they have inherited, without depriving themselves of the contributions that foreign languages give to Italian".
(Published in the Alto Adige newspaper)
This is a machine translation from Italian language of a post published on Start Magazine at the URL https://www.startmag.it/mondo/vi-prego-voi-giornalisti-salvate-litaliano-parola-di-prof/ on Sat, 30 Dec 2023 07:06:09 +0000.