Last but not least, Lucas and I offer a parody of the stereotypes, stigmas, myths, symbols, prejudices and feelings that Germans and Italians in Maastricht treasure for each-other. Interviews from Hamburg to Bari without leaving town! Special thanks to KJ the Swede.
Author: Clarissa C.
A traveler, a volunteers, an organizer, a dreamer, a writer, a talker... I'm a student for another two month
European Language Policy? Let the people speak!
Is the European Language Policy offering an adequate answer?
Well, no. When does the European Union ever give an adequate answer? Generally speaking, from what I’ve assessed during these three years of European (Union) Studies, the EU rarely provides an appropriate solution. The complexity of their decision making system, their feeble enforcement system and their subsidiarity to Member States are some of the reasons why the EU has proven to be ineffective in its objectives. The Commission may have honourable and grand intentions, as can be read in the impressive and ambitious European Commission Communication (2008), but these are too far-reaching or abstract to be operationalized. This EC communication, for instance, expresses the necessity to value all languages and overcome language barriers in order to allow dialogue and social cohesion (2008); but provides no recommendation, measure or deadline for reaching such a utopian aspiration.
Continue reading European Language Policy? Let the people speak!
Music for dialect maintenance in Italy
Dialect is an important cultural characteristic in Italy. Villages, towns, cities, provinces and regions have dialects embedded inside each-other, of which the speakers are proud but ageing with the rest of the country. According to the Facebook page Dialetto Comasco-Lecchese , spoken in the provinces of both Como and Lecco, is spoken by 6,700 facebook users (1,453 people this page) out of a total of 930,929 residents of both provinces, making up 0.7% of the total population as dialect speakers. A family of this dialect is Dialetto laghée, the dialect of Lake Como has a Facebook page liked by 350 people that reports of 1,700 users who speak it. However, these pages are not groups where communities can share sayings and proverbs, and are therefore not particularly interesting.
Notwithstanding these Facebook data, which shows scarce speaking of dialects from my area, I have assessed that these dialects are still understood by most of the population. For myself, I didn’t hear much dialect being spoken while I was growing up because my grandparents thought it would confuse me too much since I was already bilingual. However, I can understand most of what is said in Laghée dialect. This interesting fact can be explained, at least personally for me and many of my friends, through the rise of musical artists performing in dialect.
EMI 4 Laif
English teaching and learning has been embedded in my identity since my birth. My father is an English “madrelingua”, or mother-tongue speaker teaching students and adults. My mother is a kinder garden educator: she successfully gets four and five-year olds to sign nursery rhymes with her in a perfect British accent. What allows my parents to stand out as English instructors in our small community in Mandello del Lario, is the fact that their lessons are (almost) entirely taught in English. Continue reading EMI 4 Laif
Ti senti italiana or English?
Mi chiamo Clarissa, sono nata in Gran Bretagna, ma durante la mia prima settimana di vita, i miei genitori Patty, da Bellagio, and Adam, from Northern Ireland, Scotland but really Devonshire; loaded me in their little car and drove me to Lago di Como.
Lí, sono crescita con la mia sorellina, tra le montagne e il lago, l’italiano e l’inglese. People always asked me “ti senti italiana o inglese?”. Rispondevo a seconda di dove ero: “Mi sento piu inglese perche sono qui con voi e mi chiedete questo” oppoure “I feel more Italian, when I’m in England”. In reality, I felt like a blend of England, Italy, Mandello, Bellagio, Somana, Northern Ireland, Scotland, Argentina was creating my identity, making me feel, in fact, a citizen of the world. I never felt I should establish which country I BELONG TO, or which is the most important language for me, since I never thought I would ever desire to stay in one place and embody my identity in one specific culture.