Learning the languages: For Americans and Italians
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First comes the “pre-history” to the world of the late 19th/early 20th century immigrants to New York and elsewhere in the U.S., namely, a period earlier in the 19th century, when Americans wanted to learn Italian, whether in colleges or with private lessons. This effort starts with Lorenzo Da Ponte, who came to the United States in 1805, and whose impact in those years cannot be overstated.
Beginning with Da Ponte in the early 19th century, and continuing throughout the century, Italians delighted in teaching Americans how to read, speak and write in Italian. This collection of poetry was gathered mostly as teaching material – grammars, readers and dictionaries – that were in widespread use in the United States, primarily in the Northeast. Da Ponte wrote and published simple dramas for his private students and for those at Columbia College, where he became its first professor of Italian in 1825. Da Ponte and his brother Carlo maintained a bookstore as well. They shipped such publications throughout the United States wherever Italian was taught. Italian exiles in mid-century taught Italian to Americans eager to learn the language.
Much later, in the late 19th century, Augusto Bassetti, Angelo De Gaudenzi and Francesco Zanolini, developed their own grammars, dictionaries and readers specifically designed to teach English to Italian immigrants. But the goal was also stated to be (particularly in Bassetti’s case) to help Italians simultaneously improve their knowledge of standard Italian, and thus enable them to read the Italian-language newspapers and even more the book-length publications that would soon come rolling out of print shops in New York and San Francisco.
In the early 20th century, Alfonso Arbib-Costa published a series of “lezione” books designed to help Italian natives to learn English, as well as English-speakers to learn Italian. Perhaps even more significantly, Arbib-Costa’s lesson books, and those of Alberto Pecorino, helped Italian immigrants who brought to America largely an oral language, more typically dialect than standard Italian, learn how to read standard Italian. This development created and sustained a class of readers for the newspapers and magazines, and ultimately, the critical mass necessary for the development of a literary culture.
Collection Items
Grammatica-enciclopedia Italiana-Inglese per gli Italiani degli Stati Uniti [Italian-English Grammar-Encyclopedia for the Italians of the United States]. New York: Nicoletti Bros. Press, 1912.This important work of Pecorini (b. Italy, 1881; d. Argentina, 1957) was first published by the Nicoletti Brothers in 1911 “for the Italians in the…
Grammatica-enciclopedia Italiana-Inglese per gli Italiani degli Stati Uniti [Italian-English grammar-encyclopedia for the Italians of the U.S.]. New York: Libreria Nuova Italia, ed. [n.d.] .The cover but not the title page of this edition indicates that it is the "nuovissima edizione" - the newest edition - but there is no date inside.The…
Grammatica-enciclopedia Italiana-Inglese per gli Italiani degli Stati Uniti [Italian-English Grammar-Encyclopedia for the Italians of the United States]. New York: Nicoletti Bros. Press, 1912.Please review the lengthy description of this work in this same first edition, second printing (1911-1912) for a detailed description of Pecorini's…
Lezioni graduate di lingua inglese: compilate da Alfonso Arbib-Costa...Con una appendice contenente 1. un dizionario italiano-inglese ed inglese-italiano 2. un manuale di conversazione italiano-inglese 3. una lista completa di verbi irregolari inglesi [Graded Lessons of the English Language: compiled by Alfonso Arbib-Costa] New York: Francesco Tocci, Ed., 1906.Arbib-Costa (b. Livorno, 1882; active, New York, 1900–1930), professor of romance languages at the College of the City of New York, wrote texts…
Advanced Italian Lessons. New York: Italian Book Company New York, 1924 (1912).This is a copy of the Third Edition of this work, 1924, first published, in 1912. Arbib-Costa (b. Livorno, 1882; active, New York, 1900–1930),…
Italian Lessons. New York: Italian Book Company New York, 1914 [copyright]."New & Revised edition. " This "new and revised edition [was] printed from new plates." (From "new plates" is the very definition of a new…
Italian Lessons. New York: Italian Book Company New York, 1914 [copyright].Fifth Edition. It seems likely that this Fifth, and the Seventh Edition, q.v., date from sometime in the 1920s, but there is no evidence in the book…
Italian Lessons. New York: Italian Book Company New York, 1914 [copyright]."Seventh Edition."It would not be until an Eighth edition in 1933, q.v. - 24 years after the original 1909 publication - that the reader would be…
Italian Lessons. New York: Italian Book Company, 1933.Eighth Edition. Arbib-Costa (b. Livorno, 1882; active, New York, 1900–1930), professor of romance languages at the College of the City of New York,…
Nuovissima Grammatica Accelerata: Italiana-Inglese ed Enciclopedia Popolare con Pronunzia. Divisa in 11 Parti.[Newest Accelerated Italian-English Grammar and Popular Encyclopedia, with pronunciation. Divided in 11 parts]. New York: Libreria De Martino, Inc./Italian Book Company, [1963].See discussion, generally, of the 1914 edition of this work. And see the additional discussion in the description of what appears to be an identical…
Nuovissima Grammatica Accelerata: Italiana-Inglese ed Enciclopedia Popolare con Pronunzia. Divisa in 11 Parti [Newest Accelerated Italian-English Grammar and Popular Encyclopedia with pronunciation [guide]. Divided into 11 Parts]. New York: Italian Book Co., [1944].See a complete description of this work in the entry for the 1914 edition. We can date this edition approximately at 1944 because the last date in…
Nuovissima Grammatica Accelerata Italiana-Inglese e guida pratica dell'italiano in America. Corso Complete per imparare a scrivere, parlare e comprendere la lingua inglese in breve tempo senza maestro [Newest Accelerated Italian-English Grammar and Practical Guide for the Italian in America. Complete course for learning to write, speak and understand the English language in a short time, without a teacher]. New York: A. De Gaudenzi & Co., 1914.This work in the 1914 "latest edition" (as indicated on the cover but not on the title page) was originally issued in 1896, when it was copyrighted by…
La più grande e completa grammatica Italiana-Inglese con la pronunzia figurata data al modo italiano [The Largest and Most Complete Italian-English Grammar with the figurative pronunciation given in the Italian manner]. [n.p.]: [n.p.], 1907.The copyright date of 1905 on the verso of the title page is, of course, indicative only that the book was not published or printed before then. On…
Ultima grammatica Italiana-Inglese teorico-pratica - sesta edizione - con la relativa traduzione e pronuncia [,] metodo perfezionato per facilmente imparare la lingua inglese senza maestro [The latest Italian-English theoretical and practical grammar - sixth edition - with the relative translation and pronunciation, [by a] method perfected for easily learning the English language without a teacher]. [Francesco Zanolini]: [New York], 1909 [1890].While his name does not appear on the cover, title page or verso of the title page, this particular grammar can safely be ascribed to Francesco…
Nuovissima Grammatica Accelerata: Italiana-Inglese ed Enciclopedia Popolare con Pronunzia. Divisa in 11 Parti [Newest Accelerated Italian-English Grammar and Popular Encyclopedia with pronunciation [guide]. Divided into 11 Parts]. New York: Italian Book Co., [1944].See a complete description of this work in that of the 1914 edition. We can date this edition approximately at 1944 because the last date in American…
Nuovissima Grammatica Accelerata: Italiana-Inglese ed Enciclopedia Popolare con Pronunzia. Divisa in 11 Parti.[Newest Accelerated Italian-English Grammar and Popular Encyclopedia, with pronunciation. Divided in 11 parts]. New York: Libreria De Martino, Inc./Italian Book Company, [1963].The original (1896) edition was self-published by the author; appears later to have sold the copyright to the IBC, and became a corporate officer of…
Grammatica-enciclopedia Italiana-Inglese per gli Italiani degli Stati Uniti [Italian-English grammar-encyclopedia for the Italians of the U.S.]. New York: Libreria Nuova Italia, ed., 1949.See entries for the 1911 [1912] editions of this work, when a copy cost $1.25.This 1949 edition cost $2.25, a fairly modest increase given the passage…
A Grammar of the Italian Language. Boston: Charles C. Little and James Brown, 1838. Simultaneously published in London by Richard James Kennett.Born Ignazio Batolo, Bachi (b. Palermo, 1787; d. Boston, 1853) received his law degree at the University of Padua, but fled the country in opposition…
Dialoghi Inglesi ed Italiani| colla pronuncia segnata a norma del nuovo| pronouncing dictionary| di| John Millhouse.| quarta edizione| arricchita d'un viaggio a Londra| di| H. Hamilton. Milano: Tip. di G. Bernardoni, 1873.The dictionaries, grammars and, as here, phrase books of John Millhouse were probably the single most popular imported works of their kind in the…
Grammatica teorico-pratica della lingua Inglese| nuovo corso completo ad uso degli italiani| diviso in due parti| di Teofilo C. Cann, Cinquantesima edizione| intermente riveduta e corretta. Firenze: R. Bemporad & Giglio.Note the use of "teorico-pratica [theoretical-practical]," a term that Zanolini, alone of the American Italian grammar writers, would use. It…
Vocabolario Napoletano-Italiano| compilato da Raffaele Andreoli. Napoli: Salvatore Di Fraia Ed., 1983.There are many dictionaries for translating Italian into one of its dialects, and the dialect into Italian. The most frequent such that I have seen…
Dizionario moderno Italiano-Inglese, Vol. I/Modern Italian-English Dictionary, Vol. II [Facsimile]. New York: Società Libraria Italiana, 1916.At 471 pages, this Italian-English dictionary, Volume 1, is immediately followed by a Volume 2, an English-Italian one, though called "Modern…
Secondo libro del manuale per imparare la lingua inglese senza maestro. Contenente storiette amene ed il segretario spedito [Second Manual for Learning the English Language without a Teacher. Containing pleasant stories and a quick secretary] [Facsimile]. New York: [n.p.], 1886.This second grammar by Bassetti followed hard on what he described in ads as the success of the first one. Designed especially for immigrant Italians,…
Grammatica Italiana per le scuole italiane all'estero; illustrazioni di testi [Italian Grammar [illustrated, {fascist} Year XV]: for Italian schools abroad]. Roma: Direzione Generale Italiani all'estero, 1937 - XV.This is a good example of a textbook developed as part of the effort by the fascist government to encourage Italian language acquisition by Italians…
Ai margini della lingua [On the Edge of Language]. Firenze: G.C.Sansoni, 1947.Menarini (b. Bologna 1901 - d. Bologna 1984) was a distinguished Italian linguist who, though he did not attend college, was a scholarly researcher…
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