This will be short and painless. So you know how here in Italy we have a sort of institution called "Accademia della Crusca" (like the Oxford Dictionary for England) that is in charge of controlling basically our Italian dictionary, the use of words by the population and also if new words come up.
For example, it was a huge scandal some years ago when in a school here in Italy a girl wrote down a word that did not exist before, petaloso, which means "full of petals", referring to flowers I suppose. Well, the Accademia della Crusca accepted it in the Italian dictionary after her teacher sent the request, so now "petaloso" is officially something you can say and it is considered an Italian word. This is a short video on how to use the word "petaloso", made by an Italian for Italians.
BUT, this is not what I'm going to talk about today. It happened that the Accademia della Crusca recently scolded the MIUR (the Italian state department in charge of school and university) for using too many English words, instead of Italian ones.
I am definitely going to say something about this.As an Italian who can (more or less) write in decent English, I consider myself very lucky. I have had some great opportunities of practicing my English, both written and spoken, and I really like to do it too. Unfortunately, if it weren't for these opportunities, I would not be able to do it with the same ease. In fact, I think that the English language we are taught at school is not enough, and in most of the cases it is also put aside not only by teachers but by students as well.
I understand the critique of "not valuing the Italian language enough" but, as we do not live in 1870 anymore, I think that it is fundamental that we learn English in order to be able not only to travel but also to understand the world we are living in. This is a globalized society and we cannot pretend that knowing just our mother tongue is enough, maybe a few years ago, but certainly not in 2018.
Also, I think I can safely say that in a few years even English will not be enough. And I'm saying this as someone who's deeply in love with Italian language, in all of its aspects.
So wake up Accademia della Crusca.
I understand the critique of "not valuing the Italian language enough" but, as we do not live in 1870 anymore, I think that it is fundamental that we learn English in order to be able not only to travel but also to understand the world we are living in. This is a globalized society and we cannot pretend that knowing just our mother tongue is enough, maybe a few years ago, but certainly not in 2018.
Also, I think I can safely say that in a few years even English will not be enough. And I'm saying this as someone who's deeply in love with Italian language, in all of its aspects.
So wake up Accademia della Crusca.