The Italian language in Switzerland or Swiss Italian (Italian: italiano svizzero) is the variety of the Italian language taught in the Italian-speaking area of Switzerland. Italian is spoken natively by about 700,000 people in the canton of Ticino, in the southern part of Graubünden (Canton Grigioni) and in the rest of the country.[2]

Swiss Italian
dialetto svizzero
Native to	Switzerland
Ethnicity	Swiss Italians
Native speakers	720,000 (2019 census)[1]
Language family	Indo-European Italic Romance Italo-Dalmatian Italian Swiss Italian
Official status
Official language in	Switzerland
Language codes
ISO 639-3	–
Glottolog	None

Characteristics

The presence of calques from French and German means that there are some differences in vocabulary between the standard registers of the Italian language used in Italy and Switzerland. An example would be the words for driving licence: in Italy, it is called a patente di guida but in Swiss Italian, it becomes licenza di condurre, from the French permis de conduire. Another example is the interurban bus: in Italy it would be autobus or corriera but in Switzerland, it is the Autopostale or posta since nearly all interurban lines are run by a subsidiary of the Swiss Post.^{[citation needed]}

Another notable difference is the use of the word germanico to refer to German people, instead of tedesco.[3] However, as in Italy, the word tedesco is used to refer to the German language.[4] In Italy, the word germanico is used in the same sense as the word "Germanic" in English, referring, for example, to Germanic languages in general.[5]

Radiotelevisione Svizzera di lingua Italiana is the main Swiss public broadcasting network in the Italian speaking regions of Switzerland. The University of Lugano is the major university of the Italian speaking part of Switzerland.

There are almost no vocal differences between Swiss Italian and mainland Italian. The phonology is very similar to Romansh and Lombard languages.

Examples

Some examples of Ticinese words that are different from Italian are:

As may be seen from this table, as well as the case with the driving licence described above, Swiss Italian has fewer false friends with English than standard Italian does, as calques from French in Swiss Italian match Latin-origin words in English more often than the Standard Italian words do.^[ambiguous]

See also

• Languages of Switzerland
• Italian immigration to Switzerland
• Italy–Switzerland relations
• Swiss French
• Swiss German
• Swiss Standard German
• Ticinese dialect

References

External links

• (in Italian) Dizionario dell'italiano ticinese, grigionese e "federale"