Vocalist.org archive


From:  "Caio Rossi" <caioross@z...>
"Caio Rossi" <caioross@z...>
Date:  Wed Jan 31, 2001  1:51 am
Subject:  Re: [vocalist] Italian Diction


VAle wrote:

> I'm also searching for a more "authoritative" source, a paper... a
document with all definitions of "official Italian", but I haven't found
anything yet.

You must have an "Academia" for the language. It's a tradition in all
countries where a Romance language is spoken. It may, though, not say
anything about proper pronunciation, since they're generally more related to
vocabulary and grammar issues. In Brazil, we have the "Cultured" Norms
Institute, at the Universidade de São Paulo, and the "Academia" ( which is
composed by famous linguists and writers ). The first one in more
scientific, while the second one is more traditionalist. I don't exactly
know how they relate to each other.

> Does in US exist some sort of a paper (of "official English")?

No. Western countries where 'barbarian' :-) languages are spoken are
barbarously more democratic in terms of language usage. Their rights and
wrongs in terms of language is socially determined, not officially. A
grammar book may be recognized as authoritative, and then NATURALLY become a
reference ( exactly like Richard Miller in singing. But, as Randy said in
one of his posts, even Miller may be questioned ). There's no such thing
like 'official' English there.

In the past, they used to imitate our grammarians ( probably French ones )
and say things like '...but in Latin...', but it's been a long time since
they've come to the conclusion that they don't speak Latin ( it's our time
now, hehe ). The way they treat their language is much more 'laissez-faire'
than ours. It's a cultural difference ( that's one of the reasons they had
to import 'coup-d'é-tat' from French :-) ).

In Italian, you have OFFICIALLY decided not to use the graphic sign for
stress on the third syllable ( counting from the end back ). If we want to
do that, it must pass in all congresses of all countries where Portuguese is
spoken! An American newspaper would have a hard time trying to spell
'resume' with no, one, or two graphic signs in our countries. Folha de São
Paulo, a big daily newspaper here, decided to extinguish the 'umlauts' by
itself and is still criticized for 'attacking' the language with such an
americanism! The same ( and much stronger ) reaction happens in France.

Bye,

Caio Rossi





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