Bern - Despite being one of the official languages \u200b\u200bof the Swiss Confederation, the Italian effort to enjoy complete equality, and Italian speakers, in many cases, they must express in German or French. Addressing the question of languages \u200b\u200bin Switzerland are so many complex business issues to be considered and certain data, such as those relating to the Swiss who use Italian as their first language, should be read carefully, to avoid offering a framework that does not reflect the reality . Health status of the language of Dante Alighieri in Switzerland we speak, with the following interview with Bruno Moretti , Professor of Italian linguistics at the University of Berne and co-director of the Institute of Italian Language and Literature.
Prof. Moretti, the status of official language of the Swiss Confederation effectively guarantees the Italian language - her second - equal in dignity to the German and the French ?
From a legal point of view I have no doubt that the Italian language in Switzerland and - potentially - well protected. The problems arise mainly from the application, which usually collides with the obstacle of cost objectively. Just think, to give just a trivial example, how many web sites of institutions and events financed by the federal government - such as Politecnici federali, ma anche musei, mostre, ecc. - non hanno pagine in italiano. Oppure si potrebbe pensare anche alla mancanza della traduzione simultanea nelle Camere federali, che costringe i politici italofoni a esprimersi in tedesco o francese. In questi casi di problemi legati ai costi, non è realistico richiedere un'uguaglianza completa e quindi si tratta di valutare quali sono gli investimenti più importanti per garantire la parità di trattamento e di opportunità dei cittadini e per garantire alla lingua italiana il valore anche simbolico che essa deve avere. Un altro aspetto che crea differenze tra la teoria - lo statuto ufficiale della lingua - e la pratica, è quello direttamente legato al maggiore peso economico e demografico delle altre due lingue nazionali principali, per cui è ovvio che ci siano in Svizzera lingue che è più importante sapere e altre meno. Questi aspetti non potranno mai essere controbilanciati in modo completo e serio dalle leggi, perché richiederebbero un investimento troppo grande di risorse con un guadagno che tutto sommato resterebbe moderato.
[ Bruno Moretti ]
Sembra che in Svizzera, in questi ultimi anni, la lingua italiana stia subendo una fase di ridimensionamento. E' così ?
Dobbiamo innanzitutto tener presente il quadro demografico, che ci dice che l'italiano in Svizzera nel 1970 era la lingua dell'11.9% della popolazione totale, while in 2000 it was only 6.5%. So we had a significant population decline, but is the consequence of the impressive growth that the Italian language has resulted in immigration. If we go back to verify the figures before the great immigration, we see that the percentage in 1950 was 5.9% and for decades the proportion of Swiss nationals who claim Italian as their primary language is stable at around 4%. Similarly, in the eighties Italy and Italian in Switzerland have enjoyed a great prestige, and prestige of this type is similar to the phenomena of moving fashion cycle: a phase of popularity will definitely follow a phase of decline of interest. But even Here we can say we have to deal with the consequences of a period that significantly positive values \u200b\u200breturned to a more 'normal'. On these phenomena has since engaged the debate on language policy in public schools, with the push to advance the teaching of first foreign language and, by some, to assign this position into English. This has obviously shown the position of Italian as a third language. In short, we can say that the present position of Italian is the result of objective factors - the declining population, and so on. - Which have been increased by their interpretation in very negative and that clashed with pressures for a reduction in costs.
German-speaking Switzerland, Italian is still - and to what extent - a lingua franca among the foreign workers of different nationalities ?
Intuitively, based on surveys and sporadic, it would seem logical to say that the use of Italian as a lingua franca has declined and is declining, but you can not forget that forecasts of this kind have already been made in the seventies, to be denied from studies done a decade later. It 'clear that the communication networks in which they fit the new immigrants do not speak Italian now know no such a dense presence of Italians as so often in the past and the contact language becomes the language of the place. It should not be But forget that for many immigrants, primarily English and Portuguese, but also immigrants from other countries who already know a Romance language - as is the case for many Africans - the Italian language continues to be a lot easier than German.
In your opinion, how can one explain the willingness to suppress the teaching of Italian in some Swiss universities ?
The source of the problem is not primarily in Italian, but in planning the university, in which a first cultural vision of the university (at least in the humanities), we moved to a vision of 'best companies' principled of productivity are a challenge to the subjects 'small'. The primary purpose then was to reorganize the university at least partly to cut costs - so much so that it was not only impressed the Italian - and when it came to evaluate what materials suppress, we proceeded on a basis that did not take account of political and cultural, and Italian, which as we said earlier, was in a phase of relative decline, has been identified as an area of \u200b\u200bpossible savings.
The issues that revolve around the protection of the Italian language in Switzerland - in his view - the sole responsibility of the Ticino and the Swiss government, or - and to what extent - it is desirable that in Italy the political and cultural institutions will follow this debate ?
From a political point of view, the protection of the Italian language in Switzerland is the role of institutions in Switzerland, since it is a national and official language of this country. E 'on the other hand in Italy's interest to follow the debate and provide, if possible, their contribution, since the fact that Italian is the language of one nation is beneficial even in Italy itself.
She is the "purity" of the Italian language, or consider an enrichment of certain words - especially Anglo-Saxon derivation - used daily from newspapers and from ordinary people ? Already
Melchiorre Cesarotti in his Essay on the philosophy of language, published in 1800, he wrote: "No language is pure." This observation is undoubtedly true, thus underlining the absurdity of purism more categorical. The problem is not that of the all or nothing but that of the measure, known here and opinions may differ significantly. It would be nice if we could distinguish between anglicisms profits - the so-called 'need for loans' - anglicisms and unnecessary, but it is not easy to do and we can only rely on common sense and try to avoid the most ridiculous and servile behavior towards' English, not forgetting the other hand loans that have always enriched the language and a language which does not take on loans is a dead language.
Youth and adolescents communicate with each other using "new" forms of writing, often ungrammatical (think of the messages on mobile phones or through internet). E 'is a statement that "welcomed" because "it has to go" or parents, educators and teachers are called to put a stop to this new way of expressing ?
Again, as in the case of purism, it makes no sense to fight against windmills, because I could not resist these types of communication that have stabilized their position. The type of language that is used in these cases is functional to the media and the social relationship between those who use it (and in some ways is also a manifestation of linguistic creativity and more an exercise in communication: we must not forget that these media have intensified the relationship of many young people with writing). The most important thing though is that young people, and not only they are aware that what is good for new forms of writing is not good in a formal letter or in a school essay and then have the ability to vary contexts, the media, the actors, etc.., demonstrated his full powers of linguistic registers and a conscience the standard. The authors
Italian-speaking Swiss are not well known in the Bel Paese ... She explains it as if ?
I believe that literary scholars might explain it much better than me, but, with the naivete of the non-specialist, to attempt an explanation by a paradox: "The border has a border and does not count." Stating that "the border has" I think the possible socio-economic causes, such as the preference of writers to publish in the Swiss Italian publishers of their region - for practical reasons - which may not have a big spread in Italy, or the most difficult of those who do not live in Rome, Milan and Florence to get in touch with the world Italian literature. Stating that "the border does not count," I think the fact that the Italian-speaking Switzerland has a population size comparable to that of a single region of Italy and therefore belongs to another country so, but its potential is relatively limited. I think there are regions of Italy with a smaller number of writers 'popular' than the Italian-speaking Switzerland.
Last question: Who is the Italian-speaking Swiss writer who prefers ?
here to answer definitely that "the border does not count", avoiding to indicate preferences.
( by Carlo Silvano )
