The easiest way to learn Italian (the mental links)
Is Italian a difficult language to learn?
As any other language, learning Italian requires dedication, study and practice. Despite that, Italian, like Spanish and French, is a Romance language which means that it developed from Latin. As you may know, the Roman Empire was incredibly vast, extended from Britain to North Africa, from Portugal to Iraq and its official language was Latin. Since Latin was spoken by many peoples from North Europe to the Middle East, it had a strong influence on several languages that are spoken at present. Italian language is the heir-at-law of Latin: that's why you will find many resemblances between French and Italian, Spanish and Italian, English and Italian and, most probably, between Italian and your mothertongue also. You may even find similar words between Italian and Arabic or between Italian and Turkish. For example, if we take into consideration the English noun "water", what is one of the English adjectives connected to "water"? "Aquatic" (an aquatic sport, an aquatic plant etc...)! Right? Well, in Italian language, "Water" is "Acqua" (notice the resemblance,"Acqua", "Aquatic"!). This is just one of the several resemblances that you will find between English and Italian. One more example: Arabic, a language which is considered so different from Italian, in fact features several resemblances to Italian; in Arabic, "table" is "tawla" (this is just a transliteration) and in Italian is "tavola" (notice the resemblance "tawla" , "tavola"!)
How can these resemblances help you to learn Italian quickly and easily?
Resemblances between the language you daily speak and Italian will allow you to create "mental links". Many times, to recall the right word at the right moment and quickly you must have connected it to something you already know. It's instinctive for the human brain connecting words that have something in common: pronunciation or resemblance in the written form.
If we go back to the example of "water", "aquatic" and "acqua", most probably you already linked in your mind "aquatic" to "acqua" (for their morphological resemblance) and obviously "water" to "aquatic" (for they are connected by concept) . Now it's easy to link "water" to "acqua". This will help you to recall the Italian term quickly, in case the language you are confident with the most is English.
Sometimes you don't find a direct resemblance between two words. In this case, you must work with your imagination! For example, in Arabic (standard) , "money" is "mel" and in Italian is "soldi". You can tell that "mel" and "soldi" have no resemblance at all, neither in pronunciation nor in the way they are written! Despite that if you speak Arabic, you surely know who the "sultan" is: a governor who displays great power and lots of..."soldi"! Even if "sultan" and "soldi" don't display a perfect resemblance, at least both have in common the consonants "s" and "l" that give them a similar pronunciation, at least in their beginning ("sul", "sol"!). Believe me: for your brain this is very enough to create a link! Thus, everytime you will hear about the "sultan" who has lots of money, you will link "sul" (sultan) to "soldi" (it's harder to explain than to apply!).
The "mental links" will help you to memorize and recall quickly words of the new language (Italian) that you have connected, wether spontaneously or with a bit of imagination!
January 17, 2017
