| Hello everyone, welcome back to ItalianPod101.com. |
| My name is Desy, mi chiamo Desy, mi chiamo Desy. |
| And in this video we're going to talk about formal Italian. |
| linguaggio formale |
| So when you study you're probably used to see the informal form on books. |
| So la forma informale, la lingua informale which is the one that uses to, so you, for example in dialogues. |
| But to be formal you have to use the third person, so lei. |
| What I mean is that as you know there are six subjects in Italian, six possible subjects. |
| So io, me, io, tu, you, lei or lui, so she or he, noi, we, you all, voi, and they, loro. |
| When you're talking to a friend of yours you just say tu, right? |
| Ciao, come stai? Tu. |
| Hi, how are you? Come stai? |
| But if you're talking to someone that you don't know or even someone that you know like your boss for example |
| and you want to be formal, then you have to use the third person. |
| lei, lei |
| Let's pay attention. I know this is tricky because lei means she, right? |
| But actually you use it with males as well. |
| Let's assume you're talking to your boss and let's assume he's a guy. |
| You have to say lei come sta? |
| Which means how are you, but in a formal way. |
| So how is she, literally. |
| But that she refers to him. |
| It's easier than it seems because actually you don't even have to think about the genre of the person you're talking to |
| because you can always use lei. |
| So come stai? How are you? becomes come sta? |
| Because the conjugation of the verb stare goes like io sto, tu stai, lei sta, right? |
| Cosa fai? What are you doing? |
| Cosa fa? What are you doing, but in a formal way. |
| That being said, you may think okay I'm never gonna use the formal language |
| but even if you're not using it yourself, be careful because people are still gonna use it with you |
| especially when you go to shops, for example. |
| So even if they say lei, still keep listening because they may be talking to you and not about someone else. |
| For example, if I'm inside a shop and you come in, buongiorno, buongiorno. |
| Cerca qualcosa in particolare? Are you looking for something in particular? |
| Cerca, third person singular, so lei cerca or lui cerca if it helps you. |
| But I'm still referring to you, I'm asking you. |
| Lei cerca qualcosa di particolare? Instead of cerchi qualcosa di particolare? |
| Another simple example could be tu sei molto gentile. |
| You are really kind, tu sei molto gentile. |
| Which becomes lei è molto gentile. |
| Technically there is no way to know if someone is referring to you or someone else |
| except from the context, okay? |
| But this is only for oral dialogues because actually in written language lei when it refers to a formal you |
| it's written with a capital letter, even if it's in the middle of the phrase. |
| Non solo la sua famiglia, ma anche lei è molto gentile. |
| Not only your family, but you as well are really kind. |
| Here I just wanted to show you that even in the middle of the phrase lei has a capital letter. |
| But from this phrase we can also notice something else. |
| So since you're referring to you as in third person, |
| you also have to change the adjectives and the pronouns. |
| Meaning, even if I'm talking about you, I'm not gonna use the adjective tuo. |
| So not even your family. |
| Non solo la tua famiglia. |
| Because in that case I would have to use tu, which is not formal. |
| So I'm using sua because that's the possessive adjective for her. |
| And the same goes for pronouns. |
| Ti regalo questo. |
| I'm giving this to you. |
| This is a gift for you. |
| Still talking to you, but in a formal way. |
| Of course, as I was saying before, it depends on the context. |
| So if you know that this person has been referring to you with lei, then le regalo questo is of course for you. |
| But if you're just talking to a friend and you're talking about, for example, his girlfriend, |
| then le regalo questo refers to his girlfriend, of course. |
| Another thing that I want to tell you is that when you use the formal language, |
| when you're using the imperative, that becomes conjunctive. |
| So if I would be saying, |
| Dammi la penna. |
| Give me the pen. |
| That becomes mi dia la penna. |
| Come. |
| Come with us to dinner. |
| Come have dinner with us. |
| From the conjunctive form, che lei venga. |
| And this is called forma di cortesia. |
| Courtesy form, basically. |
| Because I'm giving you an order, but trying to be kind, I'm just inviting you. |
| The formal form is one of the hardest things to use in Italian, |
| but I hope that thanks to this video at least you can understand it. |
| So if someone is talking to you with lei. |
| But allow me to give you a tip that may save you. |
| When someone is talking to you with the lei form and you may be confused, |
| you can just say, |
| Per favore, dammi del tu. |
| Which literally means, |
| Give me you. |
| Of course it doesn't mean anything bad, |
| it just means that the other person can refer to you with the tu form. |
| Please give me the you form. |
| You can just say, |
| Diamoci del tu. |
| Let's give each other the you form. |
| Diamoci del tu. |
| If someone else tells you, |
| Mi dia del tu. |
| For example, |
| Mi dia del tu. |
| It means that they are using the formal form with you, |
| but they want to be treated as you. |
| And that's also a life saver, |
| because then you can be, |
| Ok, then me too. |
| Anche me, anche me. |
| Dammi del tu. |
| Diamoci del tu. |
| So if you were patient enough to come to the end of this video, |
| now you know how to save yourself from the lei form. |
| La ringrazio. |
| I'm thanking you. |
| La ringrazio. |
| Pronoun for lei. |
| So la ringrazio. |
| I'm thanking you. |
| Thank you for watching. |
| Please like and subscribe. |
| And if you haven't done it yet, |
| you can sign up for your free lifetime account on italianpod101.com |
| Bye bye! Ciao ciao! |
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