Ben tornati! Welcome back!

Handshake and kiss on the cheek

As in many other countries, the way you greet people in Italy

depends on age, social status, social situation and habit. The two
most common forms of social greeting in Italy
are la stretta di mano (handshake) for people you don’t know or
have a formal relationship with, and il bacio (a kiss on the cheek)
for people you know and/or have an informal relationship with.
You normally kiss people both on meeting them and on taking
your leave. The most common practice is to kiss someone twice:
first on their right cheek and then on their left. If in doubt, just wait
for the other person to take the initiative. Female friends almost
always kiss each other on meeting, and women and men usually
greet each other with a kiss; it’s less common for two men to greet
each other in this way.

Use of tu and Lei

Italian has two different ways of saying ‘you’ in the singular:

informal (the tu form) and formal (the Lei form). Tu is used when
speaking to a friend, children, family and colleagues; it is similar to
using someone’s first name. Lei is used when speaking to people
with whom you have a more formal relationship or know less well;
it is similar to using someone’s surname and title. Italians on the
whole prefer to use tu once they get to know you or if they are
working with you.

Discussion

What is the common practice in your culture when people meet

and say goodbye?
Have you come across other languages that make a distinction
between informal and formal ways of addressing people, similar
to tu and Lei?

Saying hello and goodbye

A range of greetings are used in Italian, depending on the
time of day and the relationship between the speakers. Here
are a few examples of informal greetings used between
friends and formal greetings used by colleagues or
acquaintances:

To say hello

When it comes to saying hello, there are more formal and less
formal ways of doing so:

 informal:

o Ciao! Hi! / Hello!

o Salve! Hi! (this is particularly common in Rome)

o Come stai? How are you?

o Come va? How’s it going?

o Tutto bene? Everything OK?, Alright? (literally: All

well?)

 formal:

o Buongiorno. Good morning.

o Buonasera. Good evening.

 o Come sta? How are you?

To say goodbye

There are also formal and less formal ways of saying goodbye.
Friends would usually say ciao, and/or possibly arrivederci if
saying goodbye for a longer period of time. People who know
each other on a more formal basis would say arrivederci, or the
very formal arrivederLa, which is often used by shopkeepers or
counter staff addressing customers.

Ciao. Bye!

Ci vediamo. See you!

A presto. See you soon.

A domani. See you tomorrow.

Buona giornata. Have a good day.

Arrivederci. / ArrivederLa. Goodbye.

When taking one’s leave at the end of the evening or when going
to bed, use:

Buonanotte. Good night.

Note that buongiorno, buonasera, buonanotte can also be spelled

as two separate words: buon giorno, buona sera, buona notte.
Both spellings are equally correct.

Listen to each phrase and repeat it, paying attention to your

pronunciation.

Come stai?
Tutto bene?
E tu?
Grazie.
Ci vediamo.
Buongiorno.
Come sta?
E Lei?
Arrivederci.
Buona giornata.

Fill in the gaps to complete the following dialogues.

Esempio

– Buongiorno, come sta?

– Bene, grazie, e Lei?

Use the phrases: Buongiorno - sta - Ci vediamo - Arrivederci -

come stai - e tu.

come stai
1. – Ciao, ?
– Bene, grazie, e tu?
Buongiorno
2. – , come sta?
– Bene, grazie, e Lei?
3. – Ciao, come stai?
e tu
– Bene, grazie, ?
4. – Ciao, tutto bene?
Ci vediamo
– Sì, tutto bene. !
sta
5. – Buonasera, come ?
– Bene, grazie, e Lei?
Arrivederci
– Bene, grazie. !

Key phrases
To ask how someone how he or she is, in the sense of how
things are going, use:

Come va? How are you? (literally: How’s it going?)

This can be used in either informal or formal conversations, but it’s

more likely to be asked of a friend than an acquaintance.

To ask more specifically after someone’s health, use:

Come stai? How are you? (informal)

Come sta? How are you? (formal)

(You are not expected to talk at length about any illnesses you
may have.)

Some common replies to either question would be:

Benissimo, grazie. Very well, thank you.

Molto bene, grazie. Very well, thank you.

Bene, grazie. Well, thank you.

Abbastanza bene. Quite well.

Così, così. So-so.

Non c’è male. Not bad.

Male. Not too good, not well.

In this last case, it would be polite to respond by saying:

Mi dispiace. Sorry to hear that. / (I’m) sorry.

Addressing people by their titles
Professional titles are used much more in Italian than in
English, with graduates in any discipline being addressed
as dottore or dottoressa. In a formal relationship, Italians
always address people with their professional title (for
example, dottore, professore, ingegnere, avvocato), with or
without their surname:

Buongiorno, dottore.

Buongiorno, professoressa Bianchi.

People without a professional qualification – or whose qualification

is not known – are addressed as signore (for a man)
and signora or signorina (for a woman). The choice
of signora or signorina depends partly on the age of the woman
addressed, although in practice signorina is not used very much
and the preferred form of address is signora.

Buonasera, signora Caria.

Buonasera, signorina.

Before a surname, the title normally starts with a lower case

(small) letter not upper case (capital) letter. The final ‘e’ of titles
ending in -e (for example signore, professore, dottore, ragioniere)
is dropped before a surname:

Buongiorno, signor Rossi.

Buongiorno, dottor Bianchi.

In written Italian, titles are sometimes abbreviated as follows (in

the examples below the titles and abbreviated titles are displayed
starting with a capital letter because they are in list form):
Sig. Rossi

Sig.ra Rigali

Dott. Bianchi

Dott.ssa Fossi

Prof. Monti

Prof.ssa Tondello

Listen to the audio to hear the full titles then write them out below.
The first one has been done for you as an example.

Here are the titles and names:

Dottoressa Salzedo
Signor Fresco
Avvocato Costantini
Professoressa Cornaglia
Ragionier Cerulli ( Contador Cerulli)
Dottor Barbato
Signorina D’Antona
Professor Lopez
Signora Mirti
Ingegner Santoro
Segretaria

signora
Buongiorno, . Mi dica.

Cliente

dottor
Buongiorno. Sono Erica Piras. Ho un appuntamento con il Rossi. (tengo una
cita con el Dr. Rossi).

Segretaria

dottoressa
Ah, Piras, buongiorno. Un attimo, prego. Si accomodi. (Espera un minuto,
por favor. Tome asiento)

Dott Rossi

dottoressa
Buongiorno, Piras.

Cliente

dottor
Buongiorno, Rossi.

Dott Rossi

Si accomodi, prego. Come sta?

Cliente

Bene, grazie. E Lei?

Dott Rossi

Abbastanza bene, grazie.

Key phrases
To introduce yourself, you can either say Sono (I am) …

 Sono Gabriele. I’m Gabriele.

 Sono Giorgio Rigali. I’m Giorgio Rigali.

or Mi chiamo (I’m called) …

 Mi chiamo Paola Manzi. My name is Paola Manzi.

 Mi chiamo Mariangela. My name is Mariangela.

To ask someone’s name, you say:

 Come si chiama? (Lei, formal) What is your name?

 Come ti chiami? (tu, informal) What’s your name?

When you have just told someone your name, you normally ask
their name by simply adding E Lei? or E tu? (‘And you?’).

 Mi chiamo Sarah Evans. E Lei? My name is Sarah

Evans. And you are …? (formal)
 Mi chiamo Sarah. E tu? I’m Sarah. What’s your name?
(informal)

 Essere e chiamarsi
 The present tense forms (singular) of essere (to be) are
shown below with the subject pronouns in brackets.
 essere
 (io) sono I am
 (tu) sei you are (informal form of address)
 (lui/lei) è he/she is
 Lei è you are (formal form of address)
 Note how the formal form of address (the Lei form) has the
same verb form as ‘he’ or ‘she’. This will be the same for all
verbs.
  The present tense forms (singular) of the
verb chiamarsi (to be called; literally, to call oneself) are
shown below. Chiamarsi is a reflexive verb, which you
will learn more about later.
 chiamarsi
 (io) mi chiamo I am called
 (tu) ti chiami you are called (informal)
 (lui/lei) si chiama he/she is called
 (Lei) si chiama you are called (formal)
 Fill in the gaps with the missing word(s) to
practise chiamarsi.
 Vocabolario
il figlio son
la figlia daughter
 1. Ciao. Mi chiamo Elena. E tu? Come ti chiami ?

chiamo chiami
2. Mi Carmela Orsini. Lei, come si ?

chiami chiami
3. Mia figlia si Gemma e mio figlio si Francesco.

chiami
4. Come si il tuo collega?

Pronouncing c and g
You might have noticed that the letters c and g sound
different depending on what letters come after them.

The letter c has a ‘soft’ sound before i or e. It is pronounced /tʃ/, as

in the English word ‘church’.

cena, città
The letter c has a hard sound before a, o or u. It is pronounced /k/,
as in the English word ‘cat’.

casa, cono, curioso

The letter combination ch always has a hard sound. It is

pronounced /k/, as in the English word ‘cat’.

chiesa, chi, che

The letter g has a ‘soft’ sound before i or e. It is pronounced /ʤ/,

as in the English word ‘jump’.

magistrato, gente

The letter g has a hard sound before a, o or u. It is pronounced

/g/, as in the English word ‘garden’.

gara, lago, gufo

The letter combination gh always has a hard sound before e and i.

It is pronounced /g/, as in the English word ‘garden’.

ghetto, ghiro

ci and gi

When ci and gi are followed by a, o or u, for example

in ciao and Giovanni, i is never pronounced, unless the stress falls
on it. The same applies when they are followed by e, as in cielo.
The letter i simply indicates that c and g are pronounced
respectively /ʧ/ and /ʤ/.

Now listen to the audio and notice the different ways in which the
letters c and g are pronounced.
Spelling your name using the Italian
alphabet
To ask how something is spelled, you say:

Come si scrive… ? How is … written?

The answer is:

Si scrive… It is written …

You will need to learn the Italian alphabet in order to spell your
name. Sometimes, particularly over the phone, Italians like to
clarify which letter they have used by using the Italian phonetic
alphabet. This mainly consists of names of Italian towns, as you
can see in the list below, which shows each letter, how the name
of the letter is pronounced and the town linked to the sound
(where available).

a a Ancona
b bi Bari / Bologna
c ci Como
d di Domodossola
e e Empoli
f effe Firenze
g gi Genova
h acca hotel
i i Imola
l elle Livorno
m emme Milano
n enne Napoli
o o Otranto
p pi Pisa
q cu quadro
r erre Roma
s esse Savona
t ti Torino
u u Udine
v vi/vu Venezia
z zeta Zara

The letters are considered either masculine or feminine: for the

letter y, some people say i greca, others i greco.

Double letters such as ss are due esse, also said as doppio

esse or doppia esse.

To spell ‘Rossi’, you would say:

‘R’ come Roma, ‘o’ come Otranto, ‘doppia esse’, ‘i’ come Imola.

A few letters are only used in words that come from other
languages. These do not have a town or city associated with
them.

j i lungo/-a
k cappa
w vi doppia or doppia vi
vu doppia or doppia vu

(The masculine form vi / vu doppio is also used.)

x ics
y ipsilon or i greca

You may also hear i greco.

Listen to these names being spelled.

1. Gentileschi si scrive gi – e – enne – ti – i – elle – e –

esse – ci – acca – i.
2. Michelangelo si scrive emme – i – ci – acca – e – elle –
a – enne – gi – e – elle – o.
3. Dante si scrive di – a – enne – ti – e.
4. Da Vinci si scrive di – a – vi – i – enne – ci – i.
5. Galileo si scrive gi – a – elle – i – elle – e – o.
6. Colonna si scrive ci – o – elle – o – enne – enne – a.
7. Vespucci si scrive vi – e – esse – pi – u – ci – ci – i.

Practise introducing yourself and spelling out your name and

surname. Begin your sentences like this:

Mi chiamo …

Il nome si scrive… el nombre se escribe…

Il cognome si scrive… el apellido se escribe…

You may want to record yourself and then listen to it.

Il mio nome … mi nombre

Il mio cognome… mi apellido

Bravissimi! Bien hecho!

Summing up

This week you learned about formal and informal ways of

addressing people and how to use the most common greetings.
You also learned how to say your name and how to spell it. You
learned the Italian alphabet and practised some pronunciation
points.

Study tip for this week

As well as memorising the alphabet in the traditional way (from A
to Z), you might find it useful to practise the names of the letters in
a different order.

Many letters of the alphabet can be grouped by their sound

pattern:

bi – ci – di – gi – pi – ti – vi

effe – elle – emme – enne – erre – esse

Say these groups of letters aloud. It will help you to memorise the
correct pronunciation.

It is also worth saying the five vowels as a separate group:

a–e–i–o–u

And here is a phrase that will help you remember the sounds of
the five Italian vowels:

Anita entra in ospedale ubriaca. (Anita is admitted to hospital

drunk.)