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 Language Learning Forum : Specific Languages |  | |
| frenkeld Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 6947 days ago 2042 posts - 2719 votes  Speaks: Russian*, English Studies: German | Message 17 of 65 02 August 2006 at 6:04pm | IP Logged | ||||||||||||||
By "cultural products" I meant novels and, to some extent, cinema. I am not much of a traveler, so books and movies are important to my being able to practice a language. For those who travel a lot and get to talk to people more, it is less critical to have books and movies in order to be able to use the language at all. Edited by frenkeld on 02 August 2006 at 6:17pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||||||||
| Sinfonia Senior Member Wales Joined 6748 days ago 255 posts - 261 votes Speaks: English* | Message 18 of 65 02 August 2006 at 6:18pm | IP Logged | ||||||||||||||
What?!! Even now there are plenty of Italians (north v. south) who don't feel this 'tie'. Italians have for centuries felt a much stronger city tie than any kind of national one -- and to prove it they often went to war with each other!
??! And what about the French and the Spanish? Or the Austrians, who still controlled parts of Italy in the 19th century? ANd let's not forget it was *Sardinia* that unified Italy, with considerable help from the British and especially the French!!
Pure theory maybe, but real nonetheless. Speakers' perceptions have never been sufficient to determine language facts.
Now I can agree with you. But standardisation doesn't mean that other languages/dialects have to be subjugated or otherwise linguistically diminished.
For sure...On the other hand, pointing out linguistic facts doesn't constitute a diatribe. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||||||||
| Sinfonia Senior Member Wales Joined 6748 days ago 255 posts - 261 votes Speaks: English* | Message 19 of 65 02 August 2006 at 6:37pm | IP Logged | ||||||||||||||
Because one's right and the other isn't? :-)
Indeed you could (and all these things do constitute a branch of linguistics).
But RAI only really came into existence in the 1950s. SO what was the case before then? Didn't Italian exist? Did Venetian and Sicilian cease to exist when RAI started broadcasting?
Certainly, standardisation and mass media tend to have a great 'flattening' effect on language ('enlarging' the 'chosen' dialect; hence the global prominence of English), and non-standard varieties usually suffer -- and sometimes die. In fact, many more languages look set to die, probably including some Italian ones. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||||||||
| Sinfonia Senior Member Wales Joined 6748 days ago 255 posts - 261 votes Speaks: English* | Message 20 of 65 02 August 2006 at 6:40pm | IP Logged | ||||||||||||||
Sure...but even novels and films are sold and bought. I wasn't criticising you personally though :-) 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||||||||
| frenkeld Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 6947 days ago 2042 posts - 2719 votes Speaks: Russian*, English Studies: German | Message 21 of 65 02 August 2006 at 8:30pm | IP Logged | ||||||||||||||
And that wasn't a concern. I was just using a specific example I am familiar with to illustrate that being somewhat "anti-dialectal" does not always stem from crass consumerism and materialism.
I don't know if you'll find it ironic, but my own recent efforts in Italian stem from running into a review of a book by Diego Marani where he allegedly argues that languages dying is a necessary thing. Basically, what's to be done about dialects dying off in the age of mobility, communications, and globalization, especially when the language in question is not too different from the "official" one? I can see kids being taught Welsh and English, but standard Italian and a dialect that's not too different? Edited by frenkeld on 02 August 2006 at 10:24pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||||||||
| easyboy82 Pentaglot Groupie Italy Joined 6834 days ago 72 posts - 75 votes Speaks: Italian*, French, English, Latin, Ancient Greek Studies: Greek | Message 22 of 65 03 August 2006 at 5:22am | IP Logged | ||||||||||||||
You're right but I didn't mean that: the political union of Italy has been realized "from above" by the Piedmont (Regno di Sardegna) with the help of the French army and the support of the British press.But there was also a movement at the basis,something which came before and justified this politocal choice.Don't forget that the South of the peninsula was added to the new Kingdom of Italy thanks to an action (that of Garibaldi) which was not controlled by the Savoia.The history of the unification of Italy is a complex one and there are many factors to analyze but what I meant is this: Of course Italy is the country of the one thousands towns,with every town and city making war against its neighbour: regionalism is the rule in Italy. But this doesn't mean that when each part of Italy was controlled by other countries ,such as Austria,there wasn't a strong feeling of union with the other parts of the peninsula : this tie was felt above all by educated people and it was made of religious,cultural and above all litterary and linguistic ties.This doesn't begin with the "Risorgimento" age in the 19th since the "questione della lingua" is much older and since the 15th century educated people were discussing about a solution to unify and standardize the litterary language (solution that will come only in the 19th). 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||||||||
| Sinfonia Senior Member Wales Joined 6748 days ago 255 posts - 261 votes Speaks: English* | Message 23 of 65 03 August 2006 at 5:23am | IP Logged | ||||||||||||||
I didn't mean to imply such a link (and didn't think I had). Sorry.
I'm just reading some of the old discussions now, but meanwhile: I don't think language death is necessary, but I think it *is* inevitable. It's always happened historically, but nowadays the global mass media are speeding the processes up a hundredfold.
There's very little to be done, I fear. If a language doesn't strike young people as 'worthwhile' or 'cool', it's probably not going to last all that long (at least not in a non-mummified form). 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||||||||
| Thomaskim Groupie Joined 7273 days ago 84 posts - 85 votes | Message 24 of 65 08 August 2006 at 10:06am | IP Logged | ||||||||||||||
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[QUOTE=easyboy82]
1)Northern Dialects are generally closer to Standard Italian than the Southern ones. On what basis do you make this claim? If your definition of Standard Italian stems from the RAI newsreaders - perhaps affecting RAI radio speakers to a lesser extent - then I beg to differ. Most RAI newsreaders speak with a fairly strong Roman accent (jarring! all the doubles are tripled and quadrupled)with the possible exception of bilingual Dietlinde Gruber and a few others) 2)Young people generally use Standard Italian and not their dialects however there are exceptions:in the north-east (Veneto for instance) and in the South young people are much more likely to use dialect when speaking with familiars and friends,this is not the case of North-West and Central Italy.However in all formal and semi-informal situations everyone speaks ONLY Standard Italian. Again, where did you get this data from?Rome (central Italy) is a classic example of slangy/dialectal Italian. and the minute you venture out of cities like Milan and Turin - we are talking a 30-km radius - dialects pop up everywhere. 3)Most people don't speak a proper dialect but simply speak Italian with a regional accent and some dialectal words.In this form all dialects are mutually intelligible,even the trickiest southern ones . I think what you are saying - correct me if I'm wrong - is that most Italians are bilingual, mastering their local dialect and 'standard' Italian. 4)Venetian,Molisan ecc.. ARE NOT languages:they're dialects. SARDINIAN on the contrary is a language and no one doubts about this in Italy. FRIULAN now is regarded as a language of the Rheto-Romance group along with Ladin and Romansch (and i agree) but many Italians are not aware it is a language,considering it more as a north-west dialect. Sicilian is a particular case:someone think it is a language (and in its proper form is absolutely NOT intelligible with Italian) ,other think it is dialect.However it is generally considered as a dialect by Italians.I think the realtion between Italian and Sicilian is the same between English and Scots. Yes,dialects have their written forms,this is to write down the dialectal poetry and literature but this is not an element to consider them languages. About Ladin-Romansch: i don't consider them dialects of Italian because they're not mutually intelligible with the standard language. OTE] Again you sound very categorical in your defintions of what is dialect and what is language. I think the matter is more complex than it seems. I also fail to agree on the Ladin/Romansh vs. Italian intelligibility. When I watch RTSI (Italian-language Swiss television) broadcasts in Romansh I experience little difficulty in following what they are talking about. I think exposure to any neighboring dialect in the language continuum might help boost mutual understanding while exploding a couple of myths along the way. 1 person has voted this message useful |
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