ITAL 1001 Chapter : Week One
Document Summary
Italian is a phonetic language which means that it is pronounced as it is written. There are five vowels and 7 vowel sounds: a (father) Bene (well)/ male/ cos cos / abbastanza bene/ molto bene/ benissimo. Come stai? (how are you) people you age. Come sta? (how are you) people that are older. Come si scrive? (how do you write it) Before a,o,or u, the consonants c,g and sc make a hard sounds. Before e or i, the consonants c, g, and sc make a soft sound. The combination ch, gh, and sch have a hard sound as in cat, go and scheme. Before a final i and before i +vowel, the combination gli is pronounced like the ll in million. The combination gn is pronounced like the ny in canyon. All consonants except q have a corresponding double consonant whose pronounciation is different from that of the single consonants.
