Beatrice Matias (Malo di Bari, Puglia):

Vitality: “Did you teach this language to your children?” Yes, my oldest understands but cannot speak it. My youngest rejected it at a young age but she is trying to learn it now without any help from me.

Standardization: “Did you speak to your children in the proper form or the dialect?” I spoke only in the proper form because that is the only form that I know how to speak. Although the dialect was spoken in the house by others, I only learned in the proper form and I was not allowed to use the dialect, my father refused to allow me to speak in the dialect. At a young age, I learned how to read and write in the proper form.

Historicity: I’m Italian and I speak Italian, but Neapolitans speak Neapolitan. Father in Italian is papa, Sicilians say babbo. Different regions will say things differently, and this includes the towns in those regions.

Autonomy: Sicilians claim their language is different from Italian. Italians speak Italian but they also speak their regional dialect because the Italian dialects are influenced by the countries that they border. Italian was born from Dante, they used Latin and Sicilian for the Italian language. He was the father of the Italian language. So when I say I speak pure Italian, I speak Florentine Italian.

Reduction: There are 21 regions in Italy. They have their dialects within those regions, and those regions have those dialects, which are infinite. 

Mixture: “Do you feel any purity in the Italian you speak” Yes because I only speak pure Italian. I don’t speak Neapolitan Italian, I don’t speak Sicilian Italian, I don’t speak Italian-American- I speak pure Italian. 

De Facto Norms: “When you hear other people speak Italian-American, do you categorize them as ‘poor’ speakers?” Yes, it irks me. Especially when they say ‘mootz’ instead of ‘mozzarella’. It’s my biggest pet peeve. “Do you feel superior?” No, I think of it as giving justice to the language. It does hurt my heart because I think of it in a way they’re making fun of the language. I’ve never thought of myself as superior, never.

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Gaetano Gambino (Palermo, Sicily):

Vitality: “Will you teach the language to your children? Discuss when you were taught to speak Italian.” Yes, I plan to teach my children Italian in the future, I plan to live there at some point in my life either semi-permanent or permanently in my retirement or if/when my family plans to move back. I grew up with my parents having just come from Italy when I was born so I picked up on their Italian/Sicilian growing up and learned English from school.

Standardization: “Do you speak in the proper form or in the dialect?” Primarily in a dialect – it comes more naturally like slang unless I am in a professional environment I can sound more proper and know the primary differences.

Historicity: “Do you find a sense of identity using the Italian language— that it belongs to you?” I definitely find a sense of identity in both the culture and the language. Being able to speak fairly confidently to people I encounter and having gone to restaurants, meeting people at work, or even going to parts of Italy without my family and being able to communicate is very good and has become a major character trait of myself.

Autonomy: “Do you think Italian is different from other languages? Do you think your dialect is different from other dialects?” Italian is very similar to Spanish – Working in Diners and restaurants with a lot of others who spoke Spanish and Italian, everybody was able to understand each other even when speaking in our own language or picking up on the others after just a few weeks due to its many similarities. Most dialects are very very similar with the exception of maybe 2-3 that are very unique like Puglia/Bari or Napolean. However, Dialects can get very specific to even towns that some people can decipher based on the pronunciation of certain syllables. Several times when I am at a store with my Nonna or Father who only speak Italian – People will come up to them and ask if we are from Torretta or Carini (These towns only have ~3000 and ~25,000 people).

Reduction: “Do you think certain varieties are regarded as a sub-variety rather than an independent language?” The common phenomenon with the Italian language as I’ve seen over the years is that the proper Italian, Sicilian, and Barese are considered nearly their own language among Italians because of how hard it is to understand one if you’ve only ever spoken another. However, Roman, Florentine, Tuscan, etc are similar enough that you can understand each other but tell which region somebody is from if you are familiar enough with any dialect or the proper form.

Mixture: “Do you feel any purity in the Italian you speak?” My specific “syntax” of Italian is very mixed between proper and dialect because my parents grew up speaking Sicilian at home, but any schooling they did in Italy was right at the time when schools began phasing out the dialects and teaching proper Italian. So they started mixing it themselves and that’s the way I picked up on speaking. I also spent
nearly 2.5 years working at a restaurant where every other Italian spoke Barese and I occasionally catch myself using some phrases or words that are more common in their dialect. In a way I have made my own dialect but it is understood by all my friends and family in Italy, and work colleagues who speak the language as well.

DeFacto Norms: “When you hear other people speak Italian-American, do you categorize them as ‘poor’ speakers? Do you feel superior?” Depending on the efforts made by people it certainly makes it questionable whether or not someone is a poor speaker or is just trying to fit into a culture. Any Italian loves to hear their language being spoken, especially among the younger generation like when I hear my little brother try to speak Italian or my cousins in Italy with their accents better than mine. But then there is the older generation considered “Brooklyn slang” thinking how they pronounce “galamad” or “ricotta” or “Mutz” makes them off the boat.