Difficulty: Beginner
Italy
"Manco" is a bit more complicated than "mica" because it's often used with irony. It's also used with the impersonal third person, making it rather tricky to translate. But remembering that it means neanche (not even) can help.
Difficulty: Beginner
Italy
The word pure has several meanings, from "also" to "even," to "although." Marika explains them and gives us some examples in context.
Difficulty: Beginner
Italy
Here's more about the popular word pure. It can express encouragement, resignation, or be superfluous. Pure is often truncated to pur when it combines with other particles to mean something particular.
Difficulty: Beginner
Italy
In this new episode of "Marika explains", we clarify the use of allocutive pronouns, that is, the pronouns used to address an interlocutor. Let's start with "tu" (you).
Difficulty: Intermediate
Italy
Marino shows us how to make "maccaronara" or "spaghetti alla chitarra" (guitar spaghetti), from scratch. This special kind of pasta is from Avellino, near Naples.
Difficulty: Beginner
Italy
Nineteen-year-old Martina tells us about herself. Her dreams have changed over the years, and she now has some concrete, long-term, and clearcut goals.
Difficulty: Beginner
Italy
Massimo Ranieri has never stopped being popular in Italy. Here he sings a song about a man who thought he had found love, but then lost it.
Difficulty: Intermediate
Italy Abruzzese
Maurizio is a young student from the province of Pescara, going to school (university) in Rome. He tells us a little bit about himself, and his life in Rome. This is an excellent opportunity to compare how Italian treats tenses with respect to English, especially the English present perfect, and present continuous.
Difficulty: Adv-Intermediate
Italy Roman
Massimiliano is a musician, and together with his friend Stefano, and the mascot Cuba, he's trying to introduce the group to record labels. In addition to talking about his dream, he talks about Garbatella, the neighborhood where he was born, and which he wants never to leave.
Difficulty: Beginner
Italy
This song is one side of a phone call made to someone after meeting her at a party. But is there anyone on the other end?
Difficulty: Intermediate
Italy
As you can see from the video, Max Gazzè seems to be singing to a mannequin. The song is from the album Maximilian, and was published in 2016.
Difficulty: Intermediate
Italy
Me Ne Frego [I don't give a damn], was one of the mottoes of Fascism, coming originally from the writings of Gabriele d'Annunzio and employed by storm troops during World War One as a war cry for courage and daring, with the meaning, "I don't mind dying for freedom." The motto gives the title to this documentary about the influences of Italian Fascism on the Italian language. It was produced by the Istituto Luce Cinecittà, with materials from the historical Luce archives, and narrates the obscure attempt by the Fascist regime to create a new and unique language, a new “Italian” that fit the dogma of the dictatorship.
Difficulty: Intermediate
Italy
Mussolini forbade the use of dialects and the minority languages that were spoken in the regions bordering the countries to the north in favor of one language for all. Italians were bombarded by fascist propaganda and Mussolini's very frequent speeches.
Difficulty: Adv-Intermediate
Italy
In World War I, Italians who up until then had spoken their regional dialects, found themselves fighting side by side against a common enemy. But Mussolini was interested in fighting the internal enemy.
Difficulty: Intermediate
Italy
The segment looks at how Mussolini patterned his fiercely nationalist rhetoric after poet Gabriele D'Annunzio, while harkening back to the glory of Imperial Rome. The song in the segment refers to Balilla, an 18th century Genoese boy. In 1746, Balilla threw a stone at an Austrian official of the occupying Hapsburg Empire, which led to the War of the Austrian Succession.
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