{"id":6455,"date":"2014-07-04T16:09:19","date_gmt":"2014-07-04T16:09:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/italian\/?p=6455"},"modified":"2014-07-07T13:48:54","modified_gmt":"2014-07-07T13:48:54","slug":"julys-grammar-clinic","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/italian\/julys-grammar-clinic\/","title":{"rendered":"July’s Grammar Clinic"},"content":{"rendered":"

Your feedback and questions are very important to us, as they really help us to focus on your needs. Sometimes readers have questions about particular aspect of Italian grammar that we feel it would be useful to share with everyone. Here are three important ones:<\/font><\/p>\n

Question 1.<\/strong><\/font> From Robin: I have another \u201creader\u2019s question\u201d and wonder if you could help with a blog on it. It relates to the translation of the English:
\u201cOn arriving at work\u2026(e.g.I remembered in fact I had booked a day of holiday)\u201d
\u201cOn closing the door\u2026\u201d
\u201cOn speaking with her\u2026\u201d
\u201cOn confronting him\u2026\u201d
While doing an exam, I recently came across the phrase \u201cNel chiudere la porta, mi sono accorto che le chiavi erano dentro\u201d. In English we start each of these sentences with \u201cOn\u201d but in Italian there seems to be an option of Sul or Nel\u2026or \u201cArrivando al lavoro..\u201d? Can you help explain the translations and the prepositions?<\/font><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n\n
\"Keys<\/a><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Ever locked your keys inside? photo: <\/strong><\/font>tinyfroglet<\/strong><\/font><\/a> (CC)<\/strong><\/font><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n

Salve Robin: To express two actions taking place at the same time<\/u>, we can use three forms in Italian:
a) the infinitive preceded by the preposition nel<\/strong><\/u> (or nell\u2019<\/strong> before a vowel), e.g. \u201cNel chiudere<\/u> la porta, mi sono accorto che le chiavi erano dentro\u201d<\/strong> = \u201cOn closing<\/u> the door, I realised that the keys were inside\u201d; nell\u2019arrivare<\/u> al lavoro, mi sono ricordato che avevo preso un giorno di ferie<\/strong> = On arriving<\/u> at work, I remembered I had booked a day of holiday. The preposition sul<\/strong> is not<\/u> used in Italian, this would be a literal translation from English. <\/p>\n

b) the present gerund<\/u>, e.g. chiudendo<\/u> la porta, mi sono accorto che \u2026. <\/strong>= while closing<\/u> the door, I realised that \u2026; arrivando <\/u>al lavoro, mi sono ricordato che \u2026<\/strong> = arriving<\/u> at work, I remembered that \u2026<\/p>\n

c) mentre<\/strong> followed by the imperfect or the past continuous<\/u>, e.g. mentre chiudevo\/stavo chiudendo<\/u> la porta, mi sono accorto che \u2026<\/strong> = while I was closing<\/u> the door, I realised that \u2026; mentre arrivavo\/stavo arrivando<\/u> al lavoro, mi sono ricordato che \u2026 <\/strong>= while I was arriving<\/u> at work, I remembered that \u2026<\/p>\n

Question 2.<\/font><\/strong> From Gery: Ciao Serena, Geoff,
Qual \u00e8 la regola per l\u2019aggettivo \u2018scorso\u2019? Trovo altrettanto spesso prima e dopo il sostantivo, ad esempio: l\u2019anno scorso e lo scorso anno. Qual \u00e8 la differenza?
What is the rule for the adjective \u2018scorso\u2019<\/strong>? I often find it used both before and after the noun, for example: l\u2019anno scorso e lo scorso anno<\/strong>. What is the diference?<\/font><\/em><\/p>\n

Salve Gery: the adjective scorso<\/strong> is the past participle of the verb scorrere<\/strong> (to flow, to pass), and therefore it should follow the noun, in fact past participle used as adjectives come after the noun. However it\u2019s very common to find scorso<\/strong> meaning \u2018last\/past\u2019 before the noun, e.g. l\u2019anno scorso <\/strong>and lo scorso anno<\/strong> (last year), la settimana scorsa<\/strong> and la scorsa settimana<\/strong> (last week), l\u2019inverno scorso<\/strong> and lo scorso inverno<\/strong> (last winter), etc. In these cases there is no difference at all in the meaning or emphasis of scorso<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

Question 3.<\/font><\/strong> From <\/font>Gustavo: Ho un dubbio: il pronome \u201cvoi\u201d pu\u00f2 essere utilizzato come un pronome formale?
I have a doubt: can the pronoun \u2018voi\u2019<\/strong> be used as a formal pronoun?<\/em><\/font><\/p>\n

Salve Gustavo! The pronoun \u2018voi\u2019 is still used in some regions of Italy, especially those which had a Spanish influence, as a singular formal pronoun instead of \u2018lei\u2019<\/strong>. Lei<\/strong> was chosen to be used in modern Italian because during the Fascist period Mussolini made it obligatory to use \u2018voi\u2019<\/strong> (the so called \u2018fascist voi\u2019), and in fact some old people still use it. Therefore it is preferred not to use it simply for historical reasons. <\/p>\n

Keep those questions coming! Saluti da Serena<\/strong><\/font><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\"\"

Your feedback and questions are very important to us, as they really help us to focus on your needs. Sometimes readers have questions about particular aspect of Italian grammar that we feel it would be useful to share with everyone. Here are three important ones: Question 1. From Robin: I have another \u201creader\u2019s question\u201d and…<\/p>\n

Continue Reading<\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"author":19,"featured_media":6465,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"content-type":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[351049,732,229264],"class_list":["post-6455","post","type-post","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-grammar","tag-italian-adjective-order","tag-italian-grammar","tag-italian-personal-pronouns"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/italian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6455","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/italian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/italian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/italian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/19"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/italian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6455"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/italian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6455\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6469,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/italian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6455\/revisions\/6469"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/italian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6465"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/italian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6455"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/italian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6455"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/italian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6455"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}