Talk:Regional Italian

Italian dialects
Why did you change "dialetti d'Italia" to "dialetti dell'Italia" (I assume it was you Jorgengb, even though I haven't checked the history)? If it was to be more specific, well ok, but I think "dialetti d'Italia" should still be mentioned as an alternative, as it is just a much more natural phrase to say. And all in all, I don't quite feel the definite article adding so much... definiteness to the term, in this case.

Also, as I hinted to in Talk:Milanese, I don't think "Italian dialects" should be abolished and verboten when talking about things that are "dialects of Italy": you know, the word "Italian" doesn't just refer to a language, but is also an adjective that simply means... "of Italy" (or "of the Italians"), no more no less!

On these grounds, I'd make the introductory paragraph something like "Italian dialects is a broad and sometimes ambiguous term used to refer both to the dialects of Italian (short explanation) and to the dialects of Italy (short explanation). These latter terms ought to be used when the former creates ambiguity."

LjL 14:24, 11 Jun 2005 (UTC)


 * Oh, well, I see that you're a faster typist than me... ;-) LjL 14:25, 11 Jun 2005 (UTC)


 * I see your points, and it was actually with all our previous discussion in mind that I decided the best way to make things clear was to introduce a disambiguating page:


 * Italian dialects (disambig.)
 * "Italian dialects"="Dialects of Italian" --> Dialects of Italian
 * "Italian dialects"="Dialects of Italy" --> Dialects of Italy


 * I also tried to keep the core of that caveat in each of the three pages.
 * (And I was looking forward to some feedback from you :-) )


 * Btw.: I missed the point in your last line about being a faster typist ?!?
 * --Jorgengb 21:59, 11 Jun 2005 (UTC)


 * Nevermind, it's just that you've edited the article while I was editing the talk page... and after I got back to the article I realized you had already changed it roughly the way I had proposed :=)
 * Ok - cf. the Milanese talk page --Jorgengb 13:12, 17 Jun 2005 (UTC)
 * Some days ago I also lost an edit because you were editing the same page and I did not notice Wikipedia telling me there was an edit conflict... we just seem to be online at the same hours editing the same articles ;-)
 * Hmmm... how does Wikipedia handle such conflicts? --Jorgengb 13:12, 17 Jun 2005 (UTC)
 * By the way, don't you hate the way talk pages work in Wikipedia? All these ::: make them such a mess! For discussing, I'd much rather like something threaded like in a newsgroup or a forum.
 * Yes! I was actually going to propose you to start from scratch at the bottom of the page (well, the Milanese page, actually, where the situation is much worse...) --Jorgengb 13:12, 17 Jun 2005 (UTC)
 * Anyway, it's all fine with the way you've changed things. I just don't think the term "Italian dialects" should be so strongly discouraged, but that's points of view (anyway, those who want to use the term can keep using it, it's a free web ;-)
 * Now I'm nitpicking, but I'd remove the "correctly" from the Ethnologue sentence: it makes it sound like you're arguing with somebody who thinks that classification is incorrent -- which might actually be near to the truth, but feels slightly NPOV on Wikipedia. If the reader doesn't know how much Ethnologue's word is worth, they can click on the link and find out.
 * LjL 01:08, 12 Jun 2005 (UTC)
 * ok. Or -- what about sthg. not so strong as "correctly" but a bit more than [] (=removing the adverb completely) ? --Jorgengb 13:12, 17 Jun 2005 (UTC)
 * I've put a stern "thus". Read the sentence again, I don't think it's too bad: it says that "dialects of Italy" are languages, different from Italian, and thus they're recognized as such by authorities. Personally I think it sends the message. LjL 22:12, 26 Jun 2005 (UTC)
 * I've also added that "in linguistics, this use should be discouraged". Really, if I were the average John reading this page, I'd find the fact that saying "Italian dialects" is verboten quite weird. It's better to restrict the scope of that sentence to the field where it belongs (linguistics, even though you could well say that this is an article about linguistics, so it should be obvious...).
 * Can't you just use the word Italian Languages instead of saying dialects? In linguistics dialect is a variety of a language. In common speak dialect is a derogatory word used for languages that are not the official or majority languages usually spoken by poor or rural people who tend to keep their traditional ways and are not truly globalized.ThisguyYEAH (talk) 20:42, 16 March 2011 (UTC)
 * No. See below or cf. WP:USEENGLISH, WP:COMMONNAME, and WP:NPOV. Languages of Italy is for the officially-recognized languages; this article is for the other ones. — Llywelyn II   04:33, 22 August 2013 (UTC)

Merge?!
After these poor pages have been through all this mess, while we tried to tidy them up a bit by separating them as logically as possible, you ask us to merge them? My vote is certainly NO WAY! LjL 22:08, 26 Jun 2005 (UTC)


 * I'd say, keep the disambig page - while not ideal (but I'm not sure what would be....) it's certainly an improvement. Man vyi 29 June 2005 08:45 (UTC)


 * I agree, too. In Italy there are many dialects that aren't derivations from Italian language. The most known non-italian dialects in Italy are those spoken in Sardegna (Sardinia), Alto-Adige (Sudtirol) and Friuli. &mdash;The preceding unsigned comment was added by 192.167.38.107 (talk &bull; contribs) 14 November 2005.


 * I am for a merge under Dialects of Italy. Italian dialects and even worse Dialects of Italian are misleading. Standard Italian has come in widespread usage only with the introduction of television in Italy. There has not been the material time to form dialects, and the present ones all predate standard Italian itself. In fact, Standard Italian is based on (some specific) dialects, not the other way around. 192.167.38.107, notice that Sardinian, German and Friulian are considered languages (not sure which army Friulian has, however). --Orzetto 22:56, 9 January 2006 (UTC)

Languages or Dialects
I think that this paragraph is not really reflecting a npov. "Certain people assert that some dialects have language status (sometimes for political reasons, such as the Northern League)." I'm just wondering what the Northen League has to do with a linguistics article. Unless we insert a separate paragraph about political implications I can't see the reason why that has to be there. Or should we perhaps add what Alleanza Nazionale or Democratici di Sinistra think of the matter as well??? I am not sure of what "language status" means either... perhaps "official language status"? "According to Ethnologue, some of these idioms (normally termed dialects by their own users) can belong to different branches of the family of Romance languages. Some of these variations can be different enough to be classified as separate languages. However, there is a substantial disagreement within the scholarly community over a consistent set of parameters for that end." According to Ethnologue and to most linguists these idioms belong to different branches of Romance languages. Therefore how can we say that they are dialects of italian?? If they're not dialect of Italian as many have (correctly) pointed out in this discussion and they're not separate languages, they're dialect of which language then?? There is no "substantial disagreement" among linguists. The disagreement is at a political level. I think the whole paragraph as it is is just useless. The paragraph "Dialects of Italian and dialects of Italy" already clarifies this point. IMHO I think it should be deleted. Or re-written. I'd like to read your thoughts as well... Lorenzino 14:47, 25 February 2006 (UTC)


 * Italian Dialects is probably a better term than Dialects of Italian--as the discussion and article point out--since the latter implies that dialects come from the standard language, which is not the case here. To be truly descriptive, you would have to have something cumbersome such as "Varieties of Neo-Latin spoken in Italy" which (1) avoids the stigmatized word "dialect" in favor of the term "variety" of language, a usage preferred by many linguists today, and (2) excludes all of those non-Latin languages spoken on the Italian peninsula--Greek, Albanina, German, etc. Somewhere in here, there should be room for the old line that "the difference between a language and a dialect is that a language has an army." Jeffmatt 06:24, 9 November 2006 (UTC)

Naples

 * The large amount of mixed marriages, especially in large industrial cities as Milan and Turin, resulted in a generation that could confidentially speak only Standard Italian, and normally only understand some of their parents' dialects.

Does this apply to Naples as well? Has Italian largely replaced or is it replacing Neapolitan in everyday discourse? I know it’s part of the south, but it still also is a major port city.


 * Italian has replaced Neapolitan for years. Now in everyday usage persists a distinguishable Neapolitan accent, with some typical features of old Neapolitan but largely similar to standard Italian and absolutely intelligible with it. --89.97.35.70 20:04, 1 December 2006 (UTC)
 * Re "Does this apply to Naples, as well?" Briefly, no. First, what produces speakers of a standard language instead of local variation (dialect) is a matter of some debate; "mixed marriages" may be one of them, as might the "leveling" influence of modern communication. In any event, in Naples there doesn't seem to be (to my eyes and ears--and I have lived in Naples for 30 years) any particular drop-off in the dialect. Neapolitan has a particularly strong tradtion of poetry, song and theater, which may account for some of that persistence. Jeffmatt 05:33, 7 November 2006 (UTC)

Clarification
I am not a linguist nor do I pretend to understand the evolution of the Italian language. However, it is very clear to me that there is a clear distinction missing from this article- and that leads to much confusion and argument: The article should clarify between modern Italian dialects- which are what most native speakers speak today in addition to standard Italian- and the traditional languages of pre-modern Italy- of which there are very few native speakers today. A case in point would be Venetian and Venetian Italian. The vast majority of people who speak "Venetian" in Italy today actually speak Venetian Italian (or Italianized Venetian?). Ever since the mid-19th Century most local Italian languages began to be influenced by Standard Italian. Of course, with unification this progression intensified and, today, it would be difficult to find speakers of historic Venetian or Sicilian. I believe that these regional languages gave way to so much Italianization in the early 20th century (and this intensified during the 1950s and 1960s) that most dialects spoken in Italy today are, in fact, dialects of Italian. 66.183.217.31 00:18, 14 February 2007 (UTC)

Dialects of Italian and languages of Italy
First of all I would like to point out that there is a common misconception about the words language and dialect. A language is a way of expressing ideas in a unique way whereas a dialect is a more or less modified version of a language that presents differences in pronunciation and vocabulary. The fact a dialect of a region is uncomprehensible to a speaker of a dialect of another region should be sufficient to define the two dialects as two languages.

When we talk about dialects and languages in Italy, we should talk about languages of Italy or dialects of Italian keeping in mind that the two things are not the same (dialects of Italian is a subset of languages of Italy). For instance, some of the dialects of Italian are Emiliano and Romanesco while some of the languages of Italy are Sardo and Ladin.

This article should change its title to Dialects of Italian and it should be linked under List of languages of Italy which should be renamed Languages of Italy. It would be nice to add an Italian version of Dialects of Italian named Dialetti d'Italia. I think this article is not really well-structured. This article should be reworked. Particular attention should be placed on regional versions of the standard Italian.

The fact that the Northern League uses the local dialect has nothing to do with this article. It is diverging from the main point of the article which is creating a list of dialects of Italian. ICE77 -- 195.212.29.67 13:54, 23 March 2007 (UTC)
 * The Italian languages like Lombard, Veneto, Neapolitan, Sicilian, Piedmontese are recognised languages. They are recognised in the ISO-639-3. The following is the list of languages of Italy by Ethnologue, the registrar of the ISO-639-3. GerardM 16:10, 23 July 2007 (UTC)
 * Italian legislation and school recognise only tree as proper languages than dialects: Sardinian, Friulian and Ladin, the numbers in ethnologue are uncorrect (Lombard spoken by 8 million!!!??? I Live in Lombardy and I assure you that it is impossible), in fact in Italy only old generation use dialects, and only at home. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 80.104.57.6 (talk) 14:06, 22 February 2008 (UTC)
 * The 'dialects' of Italian from the article are definitelly LANGUAGES, not dialects. When you take a look how different are Sicilian and standard Italian (in the article about Sicilian language), you cannot say they're dialects, but 2 different languages. If you want to see an example of dialects of a same language, you can go to the pages explaining 'the differences between American and British English' or 'the differences between Serbian, Bosnian and Croatian standards of SerboCroatian'. Those are real dialects. Cheers. 24.86.127.209 (talk) 05:11, 31 March 2008 (UTC)


 * With respect, the reason there is a "common misconception" is that you essentially made up your own distinction between "language" and "dialect" and are faulting others for not following it. There is certainly a case to be made for a controversy or explanation section in this article, but languages of Italy is for languages protected by other country's armies or by the Italian government itself; at Wikipedia, everything else falls here per WP:USEENGLISH and WP:COMMONNAME, however mutually unintelligible they might be or wherever you would like to place things at your own encyclopedia. — Llywelyn II   04:20, 22 August 2013 (UTC)

Calabrian
Perhaps someone can assist here... the Calabrian languages article has a talk folder that links to "Dialects of Calabria" which in turn links here. I'm not adept at correcting this, and wonder if someone could take care of it. From what I gather, the Dialects of Calabria no longer exists. Mariokempes 05:16, 16 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Finally figured it out. Done. Mariokempes 23:16, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

Absurd
Why would one have a map say one thing and a text saying another? This is an edit war page, not an encyclopedic entry --82.207.5.183 16:44, 21 October 2007 (UTC)

clarifying the meaning of "italian"
As it is now, the intro implies that the term "dialetcs" (as far as italians are concerned) includes varieties of the italian language which happen not to be standard. This is incorrect. Non-standard varieties of Italian (i.e. dialects of Italian) are popularly called "accents" or simply (and perhaps more obtusely) "wrong Italian". The word "dialects", on the other hand, is used to refer to "vernacular (Romance) idioms spoken in Italy other than Italian" (i.e. "dialects of Italy" as opposed to "dialects of Italian"). Hence, "Italian" here should not be limited to "standard italian". I proceed to remove the word "standard". --Dakrismeno (talk) 11:51, 10 February 2009 (UTC)

Merge (dozenth time)
There seems to be a recurring argument to merge this article with Dialects of Italy. The two are to all purposes, synonymous, and as such, leaving them as separate articles will continue to generate instability. Kitty-4r (talk) 14:19, 3 April 2009 (UTC)
 * "The two are to all purposes, synonymous" Actually, except perhaps in Central Italy where there is no clear threshold between local Italian and local indigenous Romance language, the two are quite distinct. And even in Tuscany, the poles of the continuum -- Italian and local Tuscan -- are clearly identifiable. 2600:8800:A580:DAC0:9430:AB42:5DC4:3037 (talk) 18:41, 1 March 2019 (UTC)

Deleted statement that makes absolutely no sense
it actually had an important point to make, although the presentation was far from clear: milanese-italian (i.e. the variety of italian spoken in Milan) is one of the most influential dialects (of italian) at the sociolinguistic level (because of the prominent economic position that Milan enjoys). This must not be confused with Milanese, which is a variety of Western Lombard, NOT of Italian, and which is an L language in teh diglossic scenario. --Dakrismeno (talk) 16:39, 25 June 2009 (UTC)


 * Ok, I absolutely hadn't understood that from the sentence's phrasing. Still, if you want to re-add it in a more understandable fashion, I'd like a source for it. I was never under the impression that the variety of Italian spoken in Milan was any more or less influential than other varieties - it may well be due to the fact that I'm from Milan myself, but it does seem like a statement that needs sourcing in any case. LjL (talk) 17:34, 25 June 2009 (UTC)
 * Done. --Dakrismeno (talk) 11:28, 10 July 2009 (UTC)
 * De Mauro has even stated that usage that is current in both Rome and Milan is Standard Italian, fullstop. Pan Brerus (talk) 20:45, 1 June 2012 (UTC)

My contribs and some deletions
As an italian of Sicilian and Venetian origin who has extensive knowledge of sociology and dialects of his native country, I have decided to delete some "citation needed" here and there as, frankly, they were ridundant and unnecessary, or else we'd "need citations" almost every other word and the paragraphs would become unreadable. If you feel you can challenge a sentence you definitely should, but unless someone's citing a controv fact, or a specific situation, or recounting an episode that needs verification, placing a "citation needed" everywhere is rude, boring and really distracting. However, I did smooth out some of the criticized passages. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 109.112.0.148 (talk) 19:52, 15 August 2010 (UTC)

Italian in Alto Adige/South Tyrol
In order to avoid a misunderstanding (my comment could have been a bit unclear): In South Tyrol, Italian is spoken by a considerable part of the population, but there is no specific variant, since most of the speakers were settled there during the fascism and came from different regions. In fact, bolzanini are well known for speaking standard Italian. --Mai-Sachme (talk) 09:59, 7 May 2011 (UTC)

Dubious tag re Northern League
The article states in the section "Current usage": "Even strongly pro-dialect political forces such as the Northern League rarely resort to anything else than Standard Italian to write or speak publicly." I presume that this is true only in regard to writing or public speaking aimed at the general Italian public, but is false with regard to writing or speaking aimed at the local constituency. Would someone who knows for sure care to change this? Duoduoduo (talk) 13:53, 18 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Northern League's leaders talk and write in Standard Italian to locals, too. Even their (often) offensive or racist manifesti and pamphlets (printed by local sections of the party and clearly aimed to local supporters) are in Italian. 87.15.80.191 (talk) 21:26, 11 January 2012 (UTC)

This article is a downright mess
The article is much too heavily influenced by people who harbor political views about the subject. Linguists (eg Devoto, De Mauro) distinguish several levels in the tongue people speak in Italy: namely, Standard Italian (ie what you hear in theatres), spoken by a very small minority of speakers and usually not all of the time; Regional varieties of Italian, with distinguishable regional accents (intonation and phonemes) and to a limited extent different vocabularies and grammars; Regional languages, differing from Standard Italian in phonetics, vocabulary and grammar --OR-- in a few cases, regional varieties of languages less closely related to Italian such as German, Slovene ot Greek; and local forms of those same regional languages.

The situation is admittedly complicated, but it would be wrong to "simplify" it by fiat, making, say, Western Lombard a "dialect" of Italian, which it has never been, and citing the Italian state's official recognition of only a few regional languages as proof that the other regional languages must be dialects.

Trouble is, the discussion about dialects in Italy is not taking place in a purely intellectual context. In Italy, it is part of today's political debate. This is why some people become emotional about it, and why some more ride roughshod on some other people's contributions. In particular, any reference to the Lega Nord is guilty until proved innocent. And in any case, it's immaterial to the merely linguistic debate.

Although I have some linguistic knowledge, I'm not a professional linguist, so it would be too hard for me to gather the needed references and try to edit the article, in a hostile environment to boot. But I hope some unbiased, knowledgeable angel will do that, some day. Pan Brerus (talk) 20:42, 1 June 2012 (UTC)

Total revision needed here
This article needs revision starting from the very first sentence:

<>

Fair enough to label regional varieties of Italian as 'Dialects of Italian', but that designation leaves the door wide open to conflation of Regional Italian(s) and what in Italian are traditionally labeled dialetti, which are definitely not varieties of Italian, but autochthonous Romance languages that long pre-date the establishment of Italian.

Sure enough, that conflation is apparent throughout the article, exacerbated by the spurious language-dialect debate regarding macrodialetti that have achieved some status. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.134.23.211 (talk) 16:17, 24 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Still needs help. Possibly including the Italian equivalents of various English terms (or explaining the differences) would help, but see my notes below concerning other issues. — Llywelyn II   04:14, 22 August 2013 (UTC)

Solution to reduce confusion: Drop 'dialect' when speaking of Italian; use 'variety'
It's quite understandable that there's a terminological and conceptual battle going on here, but it's endless, and it's also confusing to readers who don't understand the Italian linguistic situation (not to mention maddening to those who do). One way to reduce the confusion would be to avoid using the term dialect when what is meant is a form of Italian (italiani regionali, italiani settoriali, etc.). Variety works fine in English. Then in the article that really is about what are traditionally called dialetti, explain clearly that dialect (dialetto) in that context means autochthonous minor language or something of that sort. As it is, both articles are a mess. 75.134.23.211 (talk) 02:42, 18 June 2013 (UTC)
 * Fair enough, but "variety" does not work in English, since English has a word for a "variety" of a language. (It's "dialect".) And here at Wikipedia, we aim to WP:USEENGLISH WP:COMMONNAMEs.

That's precisely the problem: there are two definitions/usages of dialect in English: one is 'variety of a language', the other is 'minor(ity) language'. Both are used (even) in the community of linguists, thus vast confusion even in specialist literature. The confusion will remain as long as the two very distinct meanings bear the same label. Variety is common lexicon understandable to any reader. The argument that it shouldn't be used to disambiguate here is akin to claiming that no effort should be made to distinguish linguist 'language scientist' from linguist 'polyglot.'

See below for a possible compromise usage with "Dialects in Italy", but it would still need to be used in addition to the more common names and not in place of them. — Llywelyn II   04:07, 22 August 2013 (UTC)

Wow, this is just awful
I'm waist-deep in some other long pages so I'm not about to wade in here and spend half the day rebuilding this only to have a regional fanboi revert everything, but I will take some time to note the major issues and hopefully help lend moral support for the well-intentioned editors who are obviously being thwarted here.

This article fails its most basic function:
 * Quickly and clearly define the main topic

That includes a clear and concise list of the major Italian dialects, not a list (at the bottom of the page) of earlier-languages-that-influence-th... whatever the hell is going on now.

Two major principles that seem to have dropped by the wayside are
 * WP:USEENGLISH and WP:NPOV.

I can't speak to the Italian terms being debated within the country but, in English, "Regional Italian" is roughly as common as "dialects" (not "more common") and calling it "more accurate" in the lede (particularly without reliable, unbiased sources) is POV pushing. You should particularly avoid a local consensus that ignores other prominent articles like language and dialect.

The shortest version is this: languages have armies and dialects don't. The languages used by other states bordering Italy (French, Slovenian) are languages, no question; the languages recognized by the Italian government are languages, no question. The rest are dialects: however much their speakers (or pet linguists) may wish them to achieve higher status, they haven't yet and Wikipedia has no business claiming the contrary. (A possible compromise would be using the phrasing dialects in Italy, which has more than enough usage for inclusion in the lede (along with the other phrasings) and throughout the article. In any case, the first two sets of tongues should be at Languages of Italy and the rest should be listed (clearly) here.

Absolutely, Wikipedia should record the controversy and its causes (the dialects are parallel courses with modern Italian, not offspring; the grammars and vocabulary can be quite distinct; there's status and money involved; &c.) but (a) that shouldn't trump clearly presenting the page's major focus and (b) it will need much better sources that 2 offline Italian books, 2 outdated encyclopedia glosses, and a genealogy website link. (Sidenote: (c) The bibliography here

– as in most pages that have them – is a disservice. Remember to use inline citations, ideally with page numbers and links.) — Llywelyn II   04:06, 22 August 2013 (UTC)
 * Sigh.


 * I couldn't help but fix some of it. Be gentle.


 * Major issues now should just be a few better sources and a history section that deals with the dialects rather than with the development of standard Italian. (The current one seems to be in the wrong article or should just be the bones for a better explanation of the development and differences between the major groups.) — Llywelyn II   06:15, 22 August 2013 (UTC)
 * 'Armies' are irrelevant to whether something is a language. There are plenty of examples of politically completely unrecognized languages that all linguists consider languages in their own right. Politics should not be mixed in, and only the political situation should be noted. There are a whole bunch of unrecognized speeches in Italy that are, by linguistic criteria, languages, even though they are regularly called dialetti. The quip "A language is a dialect with an army and navy" only points out the influence that social and political conditions can have on a community's perception.
 * The current article situation is indeed a mess. What should be happening is that everything about what are, linguistically, languages should go to Languages of Italy (which doesn't even belong here if this article's title would be dialects in Italy) and everything about regional Italian should be here. The mixing up of the two should be noted in both articles, of course. --JorisvS (talk) 08:09, 22 August 2013 (UTC)
 * Sigh. That didn't take long. If some of the other editors could help fix JorisvS's damage and POV-pushing, I'd appreciate it. His reversion restored most of the problems mentioned above. — Llywelyn II   23:28, 22 August 2013 (UTC)


 * Specifically as a reply to Joris:
 * Your edit was incredibly WP:POINTy and made this page worse and less informative, not better or more helpful. I don't want to sit on this page, but hopefully you can realize that what you're doing is a disservice.
 * As pointed out by your edit comment where you misunderstand tongue, your English is not the greatest. It would be nice if you could defer to the native speakers regarding what words mean or at least show some humility about what words mean in a foreign language when corrected by the locals.
 * Specifically, here, it doesn't matter whether the languages are "really" "really-real" "languages" or not. The armies absolutely matter. (If you're still confused about this, reread my post above; reread the language article; reread the dialect article; hell, reread the Standard Italian article's subsection on these dialects.) The government doesn't recognize them; the international community doesn't recognize them; and we need an article for them, as opposed to the ones that are recognized.
 * Insisting this page be merged with the languages of Italy article is sensible: there's a process for that. Use it and don't just wreck this article.
 * Please, stop hurting this page and let it heal. — Llywelyn II   23:36, 22 August 2013 (UTC)


 * I agree with Llywelyn II. I'm Italian and I live in Sicily. There is too much confusion among "Languages of Italy" and "Italian Dialects". If a linguist says that Sicilian, Venetian, Neapolitan, Piemontese, Lombard... are languages, he's right. The question is that today these languages are "dead" for several reason: they are not regulated, they are not official, they are not used in the ordinary life (everything is written in the Standard Italian language in Sicily, Calabria, Veneto, Lombardy, Naples ...), they are not taught at school and they have neither a standard written form nor a standard spoken form (e.g. Sicilian spoken in Palermo could be very different from Sicilian spoken in Messina, Venetian spoken in Venice is different from Venetian spoken in Verona as well as Neapolitan spoken in Naples is totally different from Neapolitan spoken in Bari and so on). In fact after the Italian language it's possible (but not sure) that in informal context (mostly in family) people use also the Italian language influenced by the old local language. They are not able to speak the old local languages (Sicilian, Venetian, Neapolitan ...) but they use the Italian language mixed with words and verbs of these old local languages. For this reason we refer to them as italian dialects: they are variants of the Italian language. This is the reason why I think it would be better to put the today's Sicilian, Neapolitan, Venetian ... in this article and to leave in the article "Languages of Italy" only the recognised, official, co-official, used and regulated languages (Italian, French, German, Slovene). It's not a matter of politics, it's just a matter of fact. When the linguists talk about these local languages (Sicilian, Venetian ...), they talk about the past, when these languages were widely used and spoken. But today few people are able to use them, after the Italian language, in informal context the majority is able to speak only their own Regional Italian (or dialect). So, today in Italy when we talk about Sicilian, Venetian, Lombard ... we talk about Italian dialects and not about the old local languages. The confusion comes from the fact that e.g. the term "Sicilian" is used both for the today's Italian dialect spoken in Sicily and for the old Sicilian language used in the past. We have the same confusion in each region of Italy. The level of confusion about this issue is so high that in the Italian Wikipedia we have the same problem; this issue is also made worse by the so-called "folkloristic" or "regionalist" users without a neutral point of view. The mistake of organisations like Ethnologue or Unesco was e.g. they say that Sicilian language is spoken by about 4 million people; in reality 4 million people are able to speak the Italian dialect of Sicily and not the (old) Sicilian language that is spoken by much less people; there is the same misunderstanding in each Italy-related old language (Venetian, Lombard, Neapolitan, Piemontese, Friulian ...)--Walter J. Rotelmayer (talk) 01:16, 23 August 2013 (UTC)
 * You're wrong. These languages maybe seldom written, but they are still spoken colloquially by some and hence are still alive. Regulation or officiality does nothing to make a language dead or alive (it can only help to keep a language alive, or conversely). For most of history and still in many places around the world the (local) languages are not taught, but, again, this does not mean that those languages are necessarily in some way 'dead'. What you are referring to is actually Regional Italian, not these languages. Sicilian, Neapolitan, or Venetian Regional Italian should be covered in this article. It would be a matter of politics if we would leave only the official regional languages to Languages of Italy, because such recognition is in its essence political. --JorisvS (talk) 08:05, 23 August 2013 (UTC)
 * And that is an understandable POV, but you (a) need to support it with reliable sources and (b) need to realize that what you're talking about is merging this page with languages of Italy and replacing it with something completely different. And there's a different procedure for that than reverting article improvements. — Llywelyn II   12:02, 23 August 2013 (UTC)


 * Since I really don't want to sit here and protect the page but can see that Joris is just talking past Walter and me and going to continue reverting to the mess complained of for the past several years, I'll add some RfC banners. It sounds like someone needs to do research into whether "Italian dialects" applies to the Venetian language or Venetian-flavored Standard Italian: I went with what the page previously claimed (where it treated Venetian language the same way China treats Cantonese language) but it wasn't well-sourced and might've been wrong. In that case, the content of this page should be merged with languages of Italy and then entirely rebuilt as a discussion of flavors of Standard Italian.


 * (Based on the earlier form of this article, the terminology at Standard Italian and Languages of Italy, Walter's comments above, Joris 's comments above, &c., I don't think it's true that these languages are not what is meant when someone refers to "Italian dialects", but let's me be more diplomatic and let's us get some more opinions and sources.) — Llywelyn II   12:10, 23 August 2013 (UTC)

Llywelyn, let me assure you that Joris is not pushing POV. S/he is trying to clarify (with obviously expert knowledge of the field) some of the confusion, conflation and outright nonsense expressed both in the article and in these talk entries. Go to a source as accessible and as popularized as Lepschy and Lepschy's The Italian Language Today, pp. 12-13 and you'll see confirmation of what Joris is saying. S/he should be encouraged, not discouraged in his/her efforts to sort out this article.

I haven't followed the discussion on this, but here's a clarification: Venetian refers to the language of Venice; Venetan refers to the language(s) of the Veneto; neither refers to the Regional Italian of Venice or the Veneto. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.134.23.211 (talk) 18:01, 28 August 2013 (UTC)

Mod help
I fixed the redirect Dialects of Italy to point here, but it still has an edit history that needs to be merged. — Llywelyn II   04:25, 22 August 2013 (UTC)

RfC: What is this page about?
Starting a RfC: the last few years of the page have seen one complaint after another about how awful the article is; I started an improvement; almost immediately, it degenerated into an edit war.

So, with the knowledge that this stirs up POVy passions we need to work past, we could use some guidance:
 * IN ENGLISH, should "Italian dialects" describe
 * non-recognized languages like Venetian or
 * only regional flavors of Standard Italian?

Comment here. Answer should mean some version of my edits (listing major Italian varieties of Gallo-Romance and Italo-Dalmatian) should be kept; answer  should mean that the existing page we've got should be merged with languages of Italy. In that case, we'll need help rebuilding it; and (in any case) we could use better sources. — Llywelyn II   12:37, 23 August 2013 (UTC)
 * My understanding is that "regional flavours" are not called dialects; they should be the topic of Regional Italian. I think this article should be made a disambiguation page pointing to Languages of Italy for "dialects" and to Regional Italian for local language-influenced Standard Italian. — Lfdder (talk) 13:07, 23 August 2013 (UTC)
 * That sounds like a big improvement, because it makes the distinct topics of the articles more clear. --JorisvS (talk) 16:19, 23 August 2013 (UTC)


 * What does this RfC have to do with politics, government and law? — Lfdder (talk) 13:41, 23 August 2013 (UTC)
 * Mostly trying to get more voices (doesn't seem to have helped), but the entire debate is whether we should divide the content between the language and dialect pages on the basis of their legal status or their linguistic differentiation. I imagine (if they were commenting) RfC politics & law have a different bias than RfC linguistics on the point. — Llywelyn II   09:06, 26 August 2013 (UTC)
 * "divide the content between the language and dialect pages on the basis of their legal status" So just because a language is not officially recognised, it's a dialect? — Lfdder (talk) 09:49, 26 August 2013 (UTC)

A Neither the description "Italian dialect" nor "Language of Italy" has anything to do with official recognition, which is a political act, not a linguistic categorization. For example, the Italian government "recognizes" Friulan but not (e.g.) Piemontese. There is no scientifically respectable linguistic or sociolinguistic argument to justify the selection of one and rejection of the other; the decision is solely political. The Italian government also recognizes Sardinian, which doesn't even exist as a single language, but as a classic L-complex, i.e. a dialect continuum. Secondly, varieties of Italian are not referred to as Italian dialects; the usage follows the Italian usage dialetto, which refers to local autochthonous language, not forms of Italian. If you have a look at the German page Deutsche Dialekte you'll see that the similar situation is handled well there, even though the Italian situation is usually even clearer. A glance at even just the first few pages of Martin Maiden & Mair Parry, The Dialects of Italy (London: Routledge, 1997) will make the situation totally clear. The Italian Wikipedia page Lingue parlate in Italia is less clear, but should be helpful. 75.134.23.211 (talk) 02:13, 1 September 2013 (UTC)


 * Any objections to splitting up the language situation of Italy as follows:
 * Languages of Italy, covering all speech varieties that are, by linguistic criteria, languages
 * Regional Italian, covering the varieties of the Italian language that are influenced by those regional languages
 * maybe an article about the dialects-proper of the Italian language, i.e. covering Tuscan/Corsican–Central Italian
 * a disambiguation page, located at Italian dialects, that directs users to one of these pages.
 * --JorisvS (talk) 13:55, 1 September 2013 (UTC)


 * Joris, here's my view as an Italian linguist by profession. An article Languages of Italy works fine, as long as it really does cover everything in overview, with appropriate links to in-depth articles. Regional Italian(s) could, and I think should, be subsumed as a part of Italian Language, i.e. no need for a separate article IMO. This page labeled Italian Dialects will be okay once it's cleaned up to really be about Italian Dialects (for example, the History section is about Italian, not dialects). Introducing the idea of Tuscan and Corsican as dialects-proper of Italian seems very unwise to me, as it opens the door to re-introduction of considerable confusion. Corsican dialects simply aren't construable as versions of Italian, and while it's true that there's no easily-identifiable threshold between varieties of Tuscan and Italian as there is in most other areas of the country, it's also true that experts in the field fully recognize the existence of Tuscan dialects. Calamai on Tuscan dialectsBinazzi on Tuscan dialect75.134.23.211 (talk) 16:25, 1 September 2013 (UTC)
 * Keeping "Italian dialects" as an article begs the question what it would mean for a speech variety to be an 'Italian dialect'. It would only keep the confusion with the regional languages of Italy, especially those that are politically unrecognized. This can be avoided by making the topic more explicit (i.e. create Regional Italian to cover those varieties of Italian that have been influenced by the regional languages of Italy). At least in principle, the amount of information would be too much to be fully covered in Italian language.
 * What would then be missing would be an article about the area where dialects are spoken that have been mutually intelligible with Standard Italian to begin with. Because Standard Italian has been heavily based on Tuscan, it makes sense to look to those speech varieties that are closest to Tuscan. Central Italian is mutually intelligible with Tuscan and Standard Italian. Next we should look at Corsican, because it is a descendent of an early form of Tuscan. I don't know if some modern form of Corsican is sufficiently similar to Standard Italian to make it practically mutually intelligible with it, but it would at least be a relevant question. I don't know what an article covering this group of mutually intelligible speech varieties would have to be called, but simply 'Italian dialects' would be insufficiently specific, IMO, also given the confusion that exists around this topic. --JorisvS (talk) 15:23, 2 September 2013 (UTC)


 * Joris, I see what you mean, but the over-arching point of my comments above is to attempt to reduce confusion, especially having to do with the conflation of dialects and Regional Italian that pervades this article. I'm not against an article Regional Italian at all; it just seems that with the exception of Central Italy, it would be brief and easily subsumable into the article on Italian. (Mutual intelligibility is a can of worms that is ultimately unhelpful. IMO. With regard to closely cognate languages it's never binary, but a matter of degree, and it's not difficult at all to find a high degree of mutual intelligibility -- if speakers want there to be -- between varieties that everyone would classify as distinct languages, e.g. Spanish and Italian.) There is a stub of an article entitled, with near-perfect ambiguity, Central Italian, at present excluding Tuscany for no apparent reason and misinformative in other ways. Perhaps that could be expanded as you mention above, with the obvious change in title to Central Italian Dialects or Dialects of Central Italy, specifying at the outset that what's treated are the historically autochthonous speech types, not varieties of Italian that have arisen post-unification.75.134.23.211 (talk) 18:51, 2 September 2013 (UTC)
 * In what way would an article on Regional Italian have to be brief? It would, of course, go into the important details of the differences between various forms of Regional Italian.
 * Although mutual intelligibility is not without its difficulties, its degree is a strong indicator of structural differences. Though, yes, speakers of Italian and Spanish can change(!) what they say so that in informal situations there can be sufficient communication, when they are not in such a position to adapt what they speak, intelligibility is only partial. --JorisvS (talk) 08:30, 3 September 2013 (UTC)
 * I don't know about the differences between the Tuscan varieties and those that are currently under "Central Italian", so nor whether such a split is justifiable or not, but the Italian Wikipedia also makes the split. In any case, it would of course be good if Central Italian can be expanded. That said, I have seen no good reason not to start clarifying the situation by having an article entitled Regional Italian. --JorisvS (talk) 10:06, 6 September 2013 (UTC)
 * ✅OK, I've reverted the content fork that was in this article and moved it to Regional Italian to clarify its intended scope. I'll hold off making major changes to Central Italian pending good sources about that subject. --JorisvS (talk) 12:26, 6 September 2013 (UTC)
 * Great, thanks. — Lfdder (talk) 12:30, 6 September 2013 (UTC)
 * Oh my... The Regional Italian article, with a lot of further cleanup, will probably be okay. But now the category Italian dialects is buried among all the languages of Italy. It's tempting to observe that the function of a -pedia is to inform people, not further confuse them -- the dialetti are now almost totally obscured.
 * As for Central Italian, note that the article in the Italian Wikipedia is entitled Dialetti italiani mediani, whereas the stub in English is Central Italian. Dialetti italiani mediani makes descriptive sense and is the usual term for the area covered. Central Italian, on the other hand, assuming it's a reference to language(s) of some sort (i.e. Central Italian what?), is ambiguous: the Italian spoken in Central Italy, the dialects of Central Italy. Central Italian Dialects as a label can work as a parallel to Dialetti italiani mediani, as long as it's immediately specified that Tuscan varieties are excluded and why.75.134.23.211 (talk) 12:56, 6 September 2013 (UTC)
 * What "dialetti"? The regional languages of Italy without political recognition? Those are rightfully covered in Languages of Italy, which is about languages, i.e. those speech varieties that are structurally substantially different from Standard Italian and each other, something where political recognition is completely irrelevant. --JorisvS (talk) 10:36, 7 September 2013 (UTC)
 * "dialetti italiani", obviously. First off, since region (regione) has a technical administrative meaning in the Italian context, describing the dialects as regional can be very misleading and in some instances simply false (e.g. Umbria, the dialects in which form more a transition zone than an identifiable type). Second, the dialects are, of course, languages of Italy, but by subsuming them into that much larger collection of speech types without further elaboration elsewhere, the particular historical, cultural, sociolinguistic (etc.) character of the dialects is obscured. The article Italian dialects was on its way to being cleaned up and made informative. Diluting it and demoting it to only a sub-component of an article whose lead paragraph speaks only of Italian and regional languages does no one who's trying to understand the linguistic landscape any favors. An explanatory summary section on dialects in a Languages of Italy article is essential, of course. That should then link to an article treating the dialects. 75.134.23.211 (talk) 14:46, 7 September 2013 (UTC)
 * Of course, this is the English Wikipedia, and its translation is, of course, "Italian dialects". By the English definition of the word "dialect", it does not refer to any of the (non-recognized) regional languages of Italy. You're confusing dialects with languages! No matter their political recognition, the speech varieties that are sufficiently structurally distinct from Standard Italian are NOT dialects. The regional (yes!, see the section below) languages of Italy are not a subset of the "Italian language", but "Regional Italian" is. The situation is currently already far more informative than the previous situation, where there were two articles that were apparently about the same subject: the languages of Italy. An article treating the regional (yes!, see the section below) varieties of the Italian language was missing, but currently exists, although it is still a bit crude. --JorisvS (talk) 13:02, 9 September 2013 (UTC)
 * "By the English definition of the word "dialect", it does not refer to any of the (non-recognized) regional [sic] languages of Italy." Except when it does. V. The Dialects of Italy, ed. by Martin Maiden and Mair Parry and any other English-language publication on i dialetti italiani. Whether dialect and dialetto are or are not unfortunate terms for the local languages is irrelevant; they're the terms that are used and the ones that people interested in the topic will encounter everywhere they look. It's not difficult to explain to readers what they mean in that context.75.134.23.211 (talk) 15:00, 9 September 2013 (UTC)
 * That's why we have Italian dialects as a disambiguation page now. A responsible encyclopedia will use the best definitions of words to distinguish between concepts and help disambiguate when colloquial usage is imprecise/confusing. I've moved some of the clarification to notes, because it made the lead stray off-topic. --JorisvS (talk) 08:20, 10 September 2013 (UTC)
 * Unfortunately, the disambiguation page didn't disambiguate all that well, but I've cleaned it up somewhat. I did leave the Tuscan + Central Italian dialects category, although there's no reason to single them out from other dialects when speaking of Italian dialects.75.134.23.211 (talk) 22:47, 11 September 2013 (UTC)
 * Actually, it did so better and more accurately than your version. The reason to single out those dialects is that they have been intelligible with Standard Italian since its beginning. --JorisvS (talk) 08:38, 12 September 2013 (UTC)
 * So has Castilian, which is irrelevant. You seem to have decided that this topic is your private playground and yours alone to do as you please, armed with just enough knowledge to be dangerous (I owe Llywelyn a shame-faced apology). You insist on obscuring for readers what is meant by "dialect" in reference to Italy, you fixate on the misleading -- at times outright spurious -- "regional" designation, and you don't bother to do sufficient research to inform yourself of the damage you're doing by misleading readers who don't have the knowledge to compensate for your peculiar individual misconceptions, conflations, etc. Wikipedia policy leaves you free to do so. But you're doing readers no service, and you're wasting your own time -- the articles will, eventually, be cleaned up and made as clear, cogent, and informative as possible.75.134.23.211 (talk) 15:20, 14 September 2013 (UTC)
 * So what are you ranting against? Using "dialects" vs. "languages" in a way that is not in accordance with your POV, even though it is the scientific definition (i.e. consequently not referring to the regional languages as "dialects" and only use that word to refer to those speech varieties that are mutually intelligible with Standard Italian) yet noting how the terms are often used? Using "regional" in a way that is normal English, even though it does not necessarily reflect the politically defined regioni? How is that "misleading" readers? --JorisvS (talk) 15:27, 15 September 2013 (UTC)
 * Your defensive posture apparently renders you impervious to both reason and facts, and I'm not going to indulge in useless bickering. You can choose to inform yourself (see the additional bibliography I added yesterday) or you can choose to continue your campaign of confusing (at best) neophytes who are interested in learning about the Italian linguistic landscape. Eventually those who actually understand the Italian linguistic situation -- along with both the conceptualizations and the terminology involved -- will clean up the mess that's here now.75.134.23.211 (talk) 19:02, 15 September 2013 (UTC)
 * I'm not going to indulge in useless bickering That's all you've been doing. You can argue with someone without being a twat about the whole thing. — Lfdder (talk) 19:56, 15 September 2013 (UTC)
 * Nice talk. Very helpful, indeed, in achieving what should be the goal here: a clear, coherent, and empirically accurate exposition of the topic.75.134.23.211 (talk) 20:29, 15 September 2013 (UTC)
 * And you think you're helping by mocking others' efforts? — Lfdder (talk) 20:56, 15 September 2013 (UTC)
 * I haven't mocked anything or anyone in any way. I have, however, slowly grown tired of wasting time trying to be helpful to readers by cleaning up some of the more dilettantish misconceptions, misrepresentations and -- alas -- confused and confusing re-writes (fantasticherie) of what is understood in, for example, the title (and, more importantly, the content) of Cardinaletti & Munaro's book Italiano, italiani regionali e dialetti. 75.134.23.211 (talk) 22:02, 15 September 2013 (UTC)
 * Are you aware that you keep insisting on this specific Italian point of view of using the word "dialects" for speech varieties that are, by objective standards, distinct languages (as opposed to dialects of a single language)? And then you call the responses of others "misconceptions" and "misrepresentations". If you weren't, you are now, and we can go back to improving the article. If you were, then you should just stop wasting others' (and your own) time. I hope it's the former. I'm open to constructive criticism and ideas that actually improve the articles, but not to ranting or mocking. --JorisvS (talk) 09:48, 16 September 2013 (UTC)
 * Are you aware that you keep insisting on this specific Italian point of view of using the word "dialects" for speech varieties that are, by objective standards, distinct languages (as opposed to dialects of a single language)? -- Yes, obviously; and it's not solely an Italian point of view. That's the whole point. The local -- by no means regional -- autochthonous Romance languages of Italy are called dialects by everyone who deals with them, inside and outside of Italy. Maiden and Parry entitled their edited compendium The Dialects of Italy because that's what they're called by all the experts who contributed articles, as well as by anyone else with any knowledge of the situation. Readers who explore beyond Wikipedia will find those languages called dialects, and the terminology here should reflect that. Your insistence that the term dialect must necessarily imply "dialect of X" is not shared by experts in the field. If you absolutely must insist on that, there is a solution, though: make it clear that they are "dialects of" the Romance dialect continuum, a perspective that is potentially quite helpful and informative if handled well. -- Your accusation of mocking is unfair and inaccurate. My point is simply this: inform yourself; study the bibliography. Uninformed edit warring is a waste of everyone's time and a service to no one -- fact, not mocking or ranting.75.134.23.211 (talk) 12:57, 16 September 2013 (UTC)
 * A) To clarify the regional vs. local distinction in English: "region" can mean any area of the physical environment, any area of the human environment, or any politically defined area, and the former two are regularly imprecisely defined, whereas the latter is, of course, more precisely defined. "Local" refers only to the immediate environment. Languages such as Neapolitan, which is spoken over a very large area, are therefore not "local". Its boundaries may not follow political borders, but this is not necessary for it to be "regional". We probably still have to clarify what is meant exactly by "regional", but we currently do this.
 * B) If people from outside Italy parrot the wording as used in Italy, that does not mean anything. I am sufficiently informed about the situation: Many speech varieties that are very different from Standard Italian, but that are regularly referred to as "dialects". You are right that readers may stumble upon a different use of the words "dialect" and "language", and so we should, again, clarify what we mean by those terms. Again, this is something that we already do. Adding something about them being part of a dialect continuum could be useful there (at Languages of Italy), but if being part of dialect continuum whose ends and many intermediates are mutually unintelligible were sufficient to call them "dialects", then we should be referring to most Romance languages as "dialects": e.g. "Spanish dialect", "Catalan dialect", "French dialect", "Italian dialect" (e.g. "I am learning the Italian dialect" instead of "I am learning the Italian language"), which defeats the use of the word. --JorisvS (talk) 14:15, 16 September 2013 (UTC)
 * Inform yourself. Study the bibliography. Start with Lepschy & Lepschy, The Italian Language Today, chapter 1. Then move on to Maiden and Parry, which is in English and thus also easily accessible. Study Savoia's chapter, "The geographic distribution of the dialects," with special care. During your reading, peruse Atlante linguistico italiano and Sprach- und Sachatlas Italiens und der Südschweiz from time to time. Get various volumes of the Profilo dei dialetti italiani series; study them and listen to the dialect recordings. For myths about Neapolitan, Edgar Radtke's 1997 book, I dialetti della Campania, is a big help. You'll learn a lot and you'll be able to contribute to this and other articles intelligently and coherently in ways that will help readers understand the topics.72.33.138.117 (talk) 17:11, 16 September 2013 (UTC)
 * As for Central Italian, I don't understand what you're saying. What is the added value of adding "dialects"? "Central Italian" does not carry any ambiguity, AFAICS. --JorisvS (talk) 10:36, 7 September 2013 (UTC)
 * I thought the question "Central Italian what?" made this clear. Central Italian gastronomy? Even if readers quickly grasp that the reference is linguistic, Central Italian tout court is perfectly ambiguous: the Italian of Central Italy, or the dialects of Central Italy. Given that anglophone readers typically may not understand the distinction in the first place, any opportunity to clarify should be taken.75.134.23.211 (talk) 14:46, 7 September 2013 (UTC)
 * If there is an article about such things, then sure, but as long as there is not, then Central Italian is not ambiguous as an article title. The national language is usually referred to as "Italian", not "Italian language", which is only used in more formal speech and when it is necessary to disambiguate "Italian". Wikipedia has the convention that titles such as "Italian", and by extension such as "Central Italian", are sufficient, unless there is a need to disambiguate it (which there is in the case of Italian language, but AFAIK not for "Central Italian". --JorisvS (talk) 13:02, 9 September 2013 (UTC)

The "regional" fixation
We're pretty much stuck with the label "regional" for local varieties of Italian, since italiano regionale is the usual Italian term. It could, and should, be clarified in this article that what it really means, i.e. the linguistic reality, is local. With regard to the dialects, the label is much more misleading -- usually simply false -- and should be avoided when at all possible so as not to misinform readers.75.134.23.211 (talk) 15:29, 7 September 2013 (UTC)
 * The English word "regional" does not refer specifically to the Regioni. Aside from politically defined regions, it can refer to some, specific or unspecific, geographical region. --JorisvS (talk) 13:02, 9 September 2013 (UTC)
 * Region(al) in English when speaking of Italy is ambiguous. It can refer to either the official political divisions or to the equivalent of zone, area. A translation trap of ambiguity in the other direction is stato, when speaking in Italian of the United States; stato (and statale) can refer to the usual Italian usage meaning 'nation state' or the 50 official political divisions that form the United States. In either case, a responsible encyclopedia entry will disambiguate rather than leave readers with the ambiguity.75.134.23.211 (talk) 14:29, 9 September 2013 (UTC)
 * Fair enough. I have moved it to the notes, because it is a bit going overboard for the first sentence of the lead. --JorisvS (talk) 08:20, 10 September 2013 (UTC)

"fonosintattic"
This heavily Italianised spelling (for "phonosyntactic" - whatever that means...) makes very clear that whoever wrote this article does not know English anything like well enough to be writing articles in it!213.127.210.95 (talk) 15:28, 5 November 2017 (UTC)

No link to Romanesco? Really?
This article has a lot of issues, but at the very least, it could include a link to Romanesco. An article without such a link has no business calling itself Regional Italian. Rwflammang (talk) 14:46, 7 April 2020 (UTC)