The Evolution of Modern Italian: An International Influence
It is evident that the Italian we speak today has become quite international, primarily due to our habit of incorporating numerous foreign words into our daily conversations. As a result, it often doesn’t sound like a purely national language anymore. We adopt many loanwords from different cultures, not only because they are concise and help us communicate more quickly, but also because they make us appear “cool.” By “cool,” I mean sophisticated in our linguistic abilities, and our globalized society requires us to demonstrate our open-mindedness.
We frequently mix different languages into our own, such as:
Italian: Ci sentiamo questo weekend? Così ti mando il link del file che mi hai chiesto.
Translation: Shall we call each other this weekend? So I can send you the link of the file you asked me.
Italian: Ho bisogno di una babysitter.
Translation: I need a babysitter.
Italian: Dobbiamo trovare una bella location questo weekend per fare delle foto.
Translation: We have to find a nice location this weekend to take some pictures.
In these examples, approximately 30-50% of the sentences are in English, even though we are speaking Italian. The amusing part is that each of these words has a proper Italian translation, which we rarely use:
Weekend: fine settimana
Link: collegamento
File: cartella
Babysitter: tata
Location: posto, luogo
As you can see, we have numerous opportunities to elevate our language by using these Italian terms in our everyday speech. However, we often prefer the foreign words, possibly because we have become somewhat Americanized!
We might consider following the example of Spanish speakers, who translate almost everything from English to Spanish. They do this out of nationalism and a strong desire to preserve and promote their national language.
What are your thoughts on this? Do you mix different languages in your speech as well?
Gregorace Translations 