Learn about irregular nouns
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| INTRODUCTION |
| Cinzia: Ciao a tutti! |
| Marco: Marco here! Beginner series Season 1, Lesson 34 - How Will You Make it to Your Italian Wedding? |
| Cinzia: Hello, everyone! I’m Cinzia and welcome to ItalianPod101. |
| Marco: With us, you’ll learn to speak Italian with fun and effective lessons. |
| Cinzia: We also provide you with cultural insights… |
| Marco: And tips you won’t find in a textbook. |
| Cinzia: In this lesson, you will learn about irregular nouns. |
| Marco: The conversation takes place at Peter’s house. |
| Cinzia: And it’s between Peter and Anna. |
| Marco: The speakers are friends, therefore, they will be speaking informal Italian. Let’s listen to the conversation. |
| DIALOGUE |
| Anna: Prendiamo l'auto per andare alle nozze di tua sorella? |
| Peter: Vorrei, ma purtroppo è dal meccanico. |
| Anna: Ah! Capisco... |
| Peter: Possiamo andare con Elena e Luca. |
| Anna: Si! Perchè no! |
| Peter: Allora prendiamo il tram fino a casa di Luca... |
| Anna: Bene! Chiamo subito Elena. |
| Marco: Let's hear it slowly now. |
| Cinzia: Ascoltiamolo lentamente. |
| Anna: Prendiamo l'auto per andare alle nozze di tua sorella? |
| Peter: Vorrei, ma purtroppo è dal meccanico. |
| Anna: Ah! Capisco... |
| Peter: Possiamo andare con Elena e Luca. |
| Anna: Si! Perchè no! |
| Peter: Allora prendiamo il tram fino a casa di Luca... |
| Anna: Bene! Chiamo subito Elena. |
| Marco: And now, with the translation. |
| Cinzia: E ora, con la traduzione. |
| Anna: Prendiamo l'auto per andare alle nozze di tua sorella? |
| Anna: Are we taking the car to go to your sister's wedding? |
| Peter: Vorrei, ma purtroppo è dal meccanico. |
| Peter: I'd love to, but unfortunately it's at the mechanic. |
| Anna: Ah! Capisco... |
| Anna: Oh! I see... |
| Peter: Possiamo andare con Elena e Luca. |
| Peter: We can go with Elena and Luca. |
| Anna: Si! Perchè no! |
| Anna: Yeah! Why not! |
| Peter: Allora prendiamo il tram fino a casa di Luca... |
| Peter: Let's take the tram to Luca's place then... |
| Anna: Bene! Chiamo subito Elena. |
| Anna: Cool. I'll call Elena right away. |
| POST CONVERSATION BANTER |
| Cinzia: So you know, I’ve only been to one wedding in my whole life. |
| Marco: Really? I mean that’s strange. I’ve heard that in the south of Italy, weddings are a never-ending eating tour. |
| Cinzia: Oh, yeah, that is so true. Actually, you start eating at lunch time, such as 1:00 PM and you don’t finish ‘til 9:00 in the evening. |
| Marco: Oh, wow! That's tough. And you keep eating all that time? |
| Cinzia: Yeah, of course. With the right poses, but yeah, we eat, dance, sing. It’s like a huge never-ending party. |
| Marco: Oh, whoa, whoa! But let’s move on now! Let’s take a look at the vocabulary for this lesson. |
| VOCAB LIST |
| Marco: Today’s first word is… |
| Cinzia: auto [natural native speed] |
| Marco: car |
| Cinzia: auto [slowly - broken down by syllable] auto [natural native speed] |
| Marco: Next word… |
| Cinzia: nozze [natural native speed] |
| Marco: wedding |
| Cinzia: nozze [slowly - broken down by syllable] nozze [natural native speed] |
| Marco: Next word… |
| Cinzia: purtroppo [natural native speed] |
| Marco: unfortunately |
| Cinzia: purtroppo [slowly - broken down by syllable] purtroppo [natural native speed] |
| Marco: Next word… |
| Cinzia: meccanico [natural native speed] |
| Marco: mechanic |
| Cinzia: meccanico [slowly - broken down by syllable] meccanico [natural native speed] |
| Marco: Next word… |
| Cinzia: tram [natural native speed] |
| Marco: tram, streetcar |
| Cinzia: tram [slowly - broken down by syllable] tram [natural native speed] |
| Marco: I just love Milan’s tram. |
| Cinzia: Oh, the orange ones. |
| Marco: Yes, yes, always so rickety going (chugga, chugga, chugga, chugga). |
| Cinzia: Yeah, they remind me like old times, no? |
| Marco: Yes, they do, although I’ve never actually driven inside Milan with my own car, but I guess being behind these things can actually be boring. It goes so slow. |
| Cinzia: Well, yes, they go slow and…but most of the times, they have their own lane. |
| Marco: Yes, they have a reserved lane only for themselves. |
| Cinzia: Yes. |
| Marco: And finally, we have a preposition. |
| Cinzia: Which is… |
| Cinzia: fino a [natural native speed] |
| Marco: to, till, until, as far as |
| Cinzia: fino a [slowly - broken down by syllable] fino a [natural native speed] |
| VOCAB AND PHRASE USAGE |
| Marco: Let’s have a closer look at the usage for some of the words and phrases from this lesson. |
| Cinzia: The first word we will look at is auto. |
| Marco: And the sample sentence is… |
| Cinzia: Prendiamo la tua auto? |
| Marco: "Shall we take your car?" |
| Cinzia: The next word is nozze. |
| Marco: Sample sentence, Cinzia. |
| Cinzia: "Le nozze di Figaro" è il titolo di un'opera di Mozart. |
| Marco: "'Le nozze di Figaro' is the title of an opera by Mozart." |
| Cinzia: Do you know Le nozze di Figaro, Marco? |
| Marco: I know, I heard about it. I think I’ve certainly heard it, but I don’t know the tune. I mean I don’t have it in my head now. So, if anybody out there loves Le nozze di Figaro, write us a comment! |
| Cinzia: The next word we will look at is meccanico. |
| Marco: And the sample sentence is… |
| Cinzia: Ho portato la mia moto dal meccanico. |
| Marco: "I brought my motorbike to the mechanic." |
| Cinzia: The next word is tram. |
| Marco: And the sample is… |
| Cinzia: Questo tram va a Piazza del Popolo. |
| Marco: "This tram goes to Piazza del Popolo." |
| Cinzia: Lastly, fino a. |
| Marco: And the sample sentence is… |
| Cinzia: Andiamo fino a casa di Mario. |
| Marco: “Let’s go to Mario’s home.” And now, let’s take a look at today’s grammar. |
Lesson focus |
|---|
| Marco: Historically speaking, Italian irregular nouns belong in large measure to three linguistic groups. |
| Cinzia: Grammatically speaking, irregular nouns are divided into four categories. |
| Marco: Sostantivi invariabili, "invariable nouns" (they don't change from singular to plural). |
| Cinzia: Then difettivi del singolare, "singular defective" (they are used only in their plural form). |
| Marco: Difettivi del plurale, "plural defective" (they are used only in their singular form) |
| Cinzia: And the so-called sovrabbondanti, "overabundant" (they have multiple plural forms). |
| Marco: In this lesson we will focus on the first two categories. The remaining two will be studied in the next lesson. |
| Cinzia: Let’s take a look at the first category, sostantivi invariabili "invariable nouns." |
| Marco: Remember that they don't change from singular to plural. Nouns that belong to this category are… |
| Cinzia: Feminine compound nouns used in their contracted form, such as automobile that becomes auto in its abbreviated form. |
| Marco: So, we have… |
| Cinzia: l'auto - le auto |
| Marco: "cars" |
| Cinzia: So, as you can see, the plural doesn’t change. |
| Marco: Then we have feminine nouns ending in -ie. |
| Cinzia: -ie |
| Marco: For example… |
| Cinzia: la specie - le specie |
| Marco: "species" |
| Cinzia: la serie - le serie |
| Marco: "series" |
| Cinzia: Then we have feminine nouns ending in -i. |
| Marco: “-i” |
| Cinzia: For example, l'analisi - le analisi |
| Marco: "analysis" |
| Cinzia: Or la crisi - le crisi. |
| Marco: "Crisis". Also in its category, we can find masculine nouns ending in -a. |
| Cinzia: -a, il vaglia - i vaglia |
| Marco: "draft, order" |
| Cinzia: Also, we have monosyllabic nouns such as il re - i re |
| Marco: "king" |
| Cinzia: And la gru - le gru |
| Marco: "Crane." Furthermore, we have nouns ending with a consonant. |
| Cinzia: il camion - i camion |
| Marco: "truck" |
| Cinzia: il tram - i tram |
| Marco: "tram, streetcar" |
| Cinzia: And finally for this category, we have nouns ending with tonic syllables. |
| Marco: For example |
| Cinzia: il caffé - i caffé |
| Marco: "coffee" (the drink) |
| Cinzia: Yes, remember this because we say - Quanti caffè vuoi? |
| Marco: “How many coffees do you want?” And one more example, Cinzia. |
| Cinzia: la virtù - le virtù |
| Marco: "Virtue." Now, let’s say the difettivi del singolare "singular defective" (they are only used in their plural form). |
| Cinzia: In this category, we can find nouns referring to objects formed by two equal parts. |
| Marco: For example… |
| Cinzia: gli occhiali |
| Marco: "eye-glasses" |
| Cinzia: Or le bretelle |
| Marco: "suspenders" |
| Cinzia: Or i pantaloni |
| Marco: "trousers" |
| Cinzia: This word can be used and sometimes, it can be found even the word pantalone. |
| Marco: Yes, we can hear il pantalone. For example - Il pantalone blu ti sta bene, “Blue trousers fit you well.” |
| Cinzia: Please remember that if you wanna speak correctly, pantaloni is the one. |
| Marco: And also remember that Pantalone (written with a capital P) is actually the name of an Italian traditional mask. |
| Cinzia: Yes. Like Arlecchino, Colombina and so on. |
| Marco: So many. |
| Cinzia: Yes, and then what do we have? |
| Marco: In this category, we also have nouns referring to a plurality of objects and realities. For example… |
| Cinzia: i dintorni |
| Marco: "surroundings, neighborhood" |
| Cinzia: Or le stoviglie |
| Marco: "tableware" |
| Cinzia: And finally for this category, we have nouns coming from Latin plural words. |
| Marco: For example… |
| Cinzia: le nozze |
| Marco: "wedding" |
| Cinzia: le tenebre |
| Marco: "darkness" |
| Cinzia: le ferie |
| Marco: "vacations, paid holidays" |
| Cinzia: Yay! |
| Marco: Yeah. |
| Cinzia: No. |
| Marco: Nice, paid holidays, but… |
| Cinzia: Not for us. |
Outro |
| Marco: I can only say one thing, that just about does it for today! Grazie e ciao a tutti! |
| Cinzia: Thank you listeners! Bye-bye! |
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