Posts from March 2009

Transitive and Intransitive Verbs

Posted by Serena 3 Comments
Mar 13 2009

A reader has asked me to explain the difference between verbi transitivi (transitive verbs) and verbi intransitivi (intransitive verbs), so I’ll try my best. This is always a difficult but, none the less, important topic in Italian grammar. OK, let’s start.

Transitivo comes from Latin transire meaning ‘to pass’, ‘to cross’, ‘to go beyond’, therefore it describes actions that move from the subject or doer directly to an object, without having to use a preposition such as ‘to’, ‘at’, etc. The classic example we learn at school is: io mangio la mela (I eat the apple); in this sentence io is the subject of the verb, mangio is the transitive verb, and la mela is the direct object or accusative. Of course we don’t always express the direct object, for example: la sera mangio presto (in the evening I eat early), the idea of ‘dinner’, ‘meal’, ‘food’ is implicit but not expressed. Similarly, we can say Giovanni guida la macchina per andare a lavorare (Giovanni drives the car to go to work), in which guidare is a transitive verb because it is followed by a direct object, la macchina. However I can omit ‘la macchina’ and simply say Giovanni guida per andare a lavorare, the idea of the car being implicit.

Intransitivo means ‘non transitive’, that is: the action does not pass from the subject to the object directly. Verbs which don’t express an action but rather a state or a condition, such as essere (to be), stare (to stay), divenire (to become), etc. are intransitive, as are verbs which express movement: andare (to go), venire (to come), arrivare (to arrive), etc. After these types of verbs we can add information about ‘where’, ‘when’, ‘how’, ‘how long for’, etc. e.g. sto in ufficio tutto il pomeriggio (I’m in the office all afternoon); Giovanni va al lavoro in macchina (Giovanni goes to work by car); il treno e’ arrivato in ritardo (the train arrived late). We can’t however express a direct object.

Verbi riflessivi (reflexive verbs) are considered intransitivi because the action takes place on the subject itself, therefore the reflexive verb lavarsi (to wash oneself) as in mi lavo le mani (‘I wash my hands’ or more literally ‘I wash myself the hands’) is intransitive, but lavare (to wash) as in io lavo il piatto (I’m washing the plate) is transitive!  You can find out more about reflexive verbs in last week post.

Don’t forget that verbs which are transitive in Italian may be intransitive in English and vice versa. For example ascoltare (to listen): in Italian we say ascolto una canzone (I’m listening to a song), however we don’t use the preposition ‘a’ (to) and therefore it’s a transitive verb because ascolto is followed by a direct object, una canzone (a song). In English on the other hand it’s intransitive because you use the preposition ‘to’ after ‘listening’ i.e. ‘I’m listening to a song’. Yes I know it’s confusing, but if you really get stuck a good bilingual dictionary can help you with individual verbs. When you look up a verb in your dictionary you should find that immediately after the word, and before the translation, there is a little acronym: either vt/v.tr which is short for verbo transitivo, or vi/v.intr, short for verbo intransitivo. So when you want to know if an Italian verb is transitive or intransitive always look in the Italian to English section of your dictionary. At the end of the day it is always important to listen to, and read as much of the language as possible in order to reinforce and assimilate these grammatical rules. After a while you will begin to ‘feel’ what is right and what is wrong.

But why is all of this so important? Are we just being pedantic or sadistic? I know it feels like it sometimes, but there is in fact a further very important reason for learning these grammatical rules: knowing the difference between transitive and intransitive verbs will help you to understand which auxiliary verb to use in the past tense: essere or avere?

In the past tense all transitive verbs are built with the auxiliary avere: e.g. Ho mangiato la mela (I ate the apple)

all verbs used in the reflexive form are built with essere: e.g. Mi sono svegliato alle sette (I woke up at seven o’clock)

all verbs expressing a state or condition are built with essere: e.g. Sei stata in ufficio questa mattina? (Have you been in the office this morning?) 

For the rest of the intransitive verbs you’ll need help from the dictionary as there isn’t a fixed rule! For example: siamo andati al mercato (we’ve been to the market) but abbiamo camminato fino al mercato (we walked to the market)

Buona Fortuna!

Il Riccio, che cos’e’?

Posted by Serena 10 Comments
Mar 10 2009

Students of the Italian language often complain that us Italians have far too many different words that say the same thing. So, in order to prove that this is not always the case, a little challenge for you: Il riccio, che cos’e’? (What is a riccio?).

Well a riccio can be four different things! Below I will give you some clues as to what these four things are, the clues are in Italian, yes it’s time to do some work!

1. Il primo si trova sulla testa di chi non ha i capelli lisci, assomiglia a una molla.

2. Il secondo ha quattro zampe e il muso appuntito. Gli piace mangiare insetti e lumache, si trasforma in una palla per difendersi.

3. Il terzo protegge il frutto di un albero e fa molto male a toccarlo. Il frutto si mangia soprattutto arrostito, bollito, o come farina.

4. Il quarto si trova nel mare, spesso attaccato agli scogli. E’ rotondo e non e’ affatto piacevole calpestarlo.

So, what is a riccio? Have a go at answering the four definitions and write your answers in the comments box below. Of course if you’re really stuck you can always resort to the dictionary. I’ll give the correct answers as well as the translations of the clues later in the week. 

Buona fortuna!

La Festa della Donna e La Mimosa

Posted by Serena 6 Comments
Mar 7 2009

Sunday the 8th of March is International Women’s Day, a festival which will be celebrated around the world. Here in Italy this very popular festival is called  La Festa della Donna. In 1946 the Unione Donna Italiana (Italian Woman Union), whilst preparing for the celebrations of the 8th of March, decided to choose an object to symbolize the event. The choice fell on the bright yellow flowers of the Mimosa, which is in blossom at the beginning of March, and since then this plant has become the symbol of La Festa della Donna. The success of the Mimosa as an emblem of Women’s Day is due not only to the fact that it blossoms at this time of year, but also to its bright yellow color, a symbol of vitality and joy which represents the passage from death to life. In addition to this, despite its fragile look the Mimosa is, appropriately, very resilient! It has become a tradition that men will buy small sprigs of Mimosa which they will then offer to women, and part of the proceedings from the sale go to support projects related to women’s causes, such as shelters for women subject to violence, breast cancer research, or co-operatives run by women in Third World Countries.

The Mimosa belongs to the Acacia family and the most popular variety grown here in Italy is the Acacia Dealbata which, given the right conditions, grows to a height of around 20-30 feet. Originally from Tasmania, this beautiful tree has yellow flowers which are very small and bunched together in bright fluffy pompons. According to the Coldiretti (Farmers Union), due to the severe winter that has delayed the blossoming of the trees the quality of the Mimosa flowers is particularly good this year, although actual production is 15% less than last year. The majority of Mimosa trees are cultivated in Liguria on the terraces facing the sea. Here the climate is ideal for these plants which, in order to grow well, should never be subjected to temperatures below zero and must be sheltered from the wind. The Coldiretti claim that the Mimosa industry is beneficial to the environment for two reasons: firstly the trees are cultivated according to eco-sustainable principles, and secondly they are grown on agricultural land that would otherwise be abandoned and subject to erosion. To give you an idea of how popular the Mimosa tradition is here in Italy it is expected that 15 million Mimosa sprigs will be sold this weekend!

To keep your Festa della Donna Mimosa flowers fresh for longer you should cut off the lower leaves with a sharp knife and put them in vase with tepid, not cold, water to which you have added a couple of drops of lemon juice. It’s important to keep the flowers in full light but well away from any heating source as the Mimosa doesn’t like a dry environment.

Finally, I’d like to share with you a few words that I’ve just read on an Italian website dedicated to Festa della Donna, which were written by someone called Giuseppe: Senza le donne finirebbe il mondo: mancherebbe la dolcezza, mancherebbe l’amore di una mamma, mancherebbe il sorriso di una fanciulla, mancherebbe la voglia di vivere … Grazie Donna! Auguri Donna! (Without women the world would end: there wouldn’t be sweetness, there wouldn’t be the love of a mother, there wouldn’t be the smile of a girl, there wouldn’t be the desire to live … Thank you Woman! Best wishes!)

Auguri a tutte le donne del mondo!

Reflexive Verbs

Posted by Serena 5 Comments
Mar 5 2009

Mi chiamo Serena. Come ti chiami? (my name is Serena. What is your name?). This is the first thing I say to my students whenever I start a new Italian class, and it’s probably the first thing you’ll find in most phrasebooks. But it’s also a sentence that illustrates really well one of the many differences between Italian and English: it is built with the verbo riflessivo (reflexive verb), and it literally translates as: ‘I call myself Serena. How do you call yourself?’.  The verbi riflessivi are a particular group of verbs in which the subject, or doer, acts upon him/herself and not on a separate object, so that the action is reflected back on to the subject. If I say lavo il bicchiere, (‘I’m washing the glass’), I’m performing the action of washing on another object; but if I say mi lavo le mani, (‘I’m washing my hands’ or literally: I wash myself the hands), I’m performing the action on myself, therefore I must use the reflexive form. The main difference between the use of the reflexive in English and Italian is that whereas in English there is often no reflexive pronoun, in Italian the reflexive pronoun is essential to the meaning and cannot be omitted.

The pronomi riflessivi (reflexive pronouns) are:

mi (myself)

ti (yourself singular informal)

si (himself/herself/yourself singular formal)

ci (ourselves)

vi (yourselves)

si (themselves)

The pronomi riflessivi should not be confused with the ‘dative’ or ‘indirect pronouns’ which are very similar. Che confusione! (what chaos!). Don’t worry, I’ll do a blog on personal pronouns soon which should help to clarify matters. But let’s go back to the verbi riflessivi.

OK! as I was saying, the pronome riflessivo must always be expressed with verbi riflessivi; and it usually comes before the verb e.g:

mi lavo I wash myself

ti lavi you wash yourself

si lava he washes himself, she washes herself, you wash yourself (formal)

ci laviamo we wash ourselves

vi lavate you wash yourselves

si lavano they wash themselves

However, it is attached to the end of the verb in the imperative form (i.e. when giving a command), e.g. lavati (wash yourself), laviamoci (let’s wash ourselves), lavatevi (wash yourselves). It is also attached to the infinitive, e.g. dovresti lavarti (you should wash yourself). Reflexive verbs are always used with the auxiliary verb essere in the combined past tenses: mi sono lavata (I washed myself), vi siete lavati le mani? (have you washed your hands?).

As you can see from the above examples, the reflexive form is normally used for actions that involve postures and parts of the body: e.g. sedersi (to sit down), alzarsi (to stand up), lavarsi le mani (to wash one’s hands), pettinarsi i capelli (to brush one’s hair).

Some verbs can be used in either the regular form or the reflexive form with very little difference in the meaning: e.g. ricordare and ricordarsi (to remember), dimenticare and dimenticarsi (to forget); the reflexive form just adds a little more personal involvement. On the other hand, some verbs change meaning when used in the reflexive form: e.g. trovare (to find) and trovarsi (to be somewhere, to find oneself); sdegnare (to disdain) and sdegnarsi (to get angry); vedere (to see) and vedersi (to see each other, to meet), as in the well known farewell expression Arrivederci! (until we see each other again!).

Arrivederci!

La Zampogna

Posted by Serena 14 Comments
Mar 3 2009

In my recent blog about Le Cioce I mentioned that although the use of this type of footwear has more or less died out it is still possible to see them being worn by Zampognari, the players of the traditional Italian bagpipes which are known as Zampogne.

The name zampogna seems to have come from the ancient Greek word symphonia, probably due to the fact that the instrument produces a harmony of sounds rather than a single note, although if the instrument is not tuned very precisely ‘cat’s chorus’ might be a better description! The faint hearted or vegans amongst you may wish to skip the following paragraph which describes the traditional construction of the zampogna.

Basically, the zampogna consists of a leather bag with pipes stuck in it. The bag is made out of the hide of a goat or sheep which has been removed whole from the  slaughtered animal (you were warned!), cured and turned inside out. The animals hair is left on and is contained on the the inside of the bag which is called an otre (leather bag, or container made out of animal skin, from Latin uter which is also the root of the English word uterus). So now, if you can imagine (or perhaps you would rather not) an inside out headless sheep with the four leg stumps protruding, the next stage is to tie off completely the two rear legs and one of the front ones. This leaves you with one leg stump into which you insert your blowpipe and a soffietto (bellows) which acts as a simple leather valve. Aha!, I hear you say, but what about the hole where the head used to be? Well this is where we insert the round stock which contains the chanters and drones (the noisy bits, for the non-musical reader).

Those of you who skipped the above description will be pleased to know that many contemporary Zampognari, particularly those from the Scapoli region, are now using instruments made from a rubber inner tube which has been covered with an artificial fleece.

The zampogna is a double-chanter pipe, the chanter being the wooden tube with finger holes resembling a recorder, and each chanter is tuned differently according to the particular folk tradition of the music to be played. Usually the double-reeded zampogna will have a soprano chanter on the right and a bass one on the left. In the dialect of the Ciociaria region where these pipes are very popular these are called ritta (right) and manga (left). Zampogne will have as many as three drones, which are the pre-tuned pipes that play a single continuous note. There is also a single-reeded version of the zampogna know as the surdellina, and it is the very short chantered version of this which is traditionally used to play the famous Tarantella.

The reed of the zampogna is usually made from stalks of the canna marina (a giant reed), although these are sometimes substituted with plastic. Zampogne, which are traditionally played throughout the southern regions of Italy and the whole of Sicily, are particularly linked with Christmas, and especially the well known carol “Tu scendi dalle stelle” (You come down from the stars) which is based on an old zampogna tune.

To find out all you ever wanted to know about zampogne but never dared ask visit the zampogna museum in Scapoli: Museo della Zampogna

I can’t help wondering who was the bored musical shepherd that, contemplating his sheep or goats one day, and wishing he had a musical instrument on which to ‘ammazzare il tempo’ (kill the time), thought to himself in a flash of inspiration: aha!

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