Are you about to travel to Italy and afraid you won’t be able to communicate? In this article you’ll find 25 essential phrases for your trip: practical, concrete expressions, the ones you’ll actually use to talk about your trip, order at the restaurant, get around, and make yourself understood even when Italian runs too fast.
Have you ever wondered if it’s really possible to review all of Italian grammar in just one article? Articles, verbs, pronouns, subjunctive, conditional sentences… everything, from beginning to end? In this guide we put together the most important pieces of Italian grammar — the ones you really need to speak well — and we organize them in order, like puzzle pieces. By the end you’ll have in your head a complete map, and you won’t feel lost anymore.
In how many countries around the world is Italian spoken? If the answer that comes to mind is “just one, Italy”, get ready for a surprise. You could order a cappuccino in Italian in Switzerland, in Croatia, even in a small corner of Argentina or the United States. Our language travels much more than you think and, when it goes abroad, it leaves surprising traces in the local languages.
Adding a small syllable in front of an Italian verb can completely change its meaning. With this article, you will learn something fundamental to truly understand Italian: how a prefix — that is, a small part added to the beginning of a verb — can transform its meaning, helping you read, listen, and speak with greater precision and naturalness.
Have you ever walked into a shop in Italy without knowing how to ask for a discount? Or found yourself stuck because you couldn’t remember how to say «me lo incarta, è un regalo» [could you gift-wrap it for me?]? In this article you will find all the expressions Italians really use when they go shopping — at the market, in the boutique, in the sales, at the till — with the most useful grammatical explanations and cultural curiosities that will make you feel at ease straight away.
Expressions like “c’ho fame!” [I’m hungry!] or “Vieni qui che ti dico una cosa” [Come here, I need to tell you something] are very common in spoken Italian, but you’ll hardly find them in a grammar textbook. In this article we analyze two phenomena typical of spoken and informal Italian — the CI ATTUALIZZANTE and the CHE POLIVALENTE — to help you recognize and understand them in real contexts.
