Name: Accademia della Crusca.
Age: Old. Established in 1583, it’s the oldest language academy in the world.
Location: Florence, of course, home of Italian culture.
Motto: “Il più bel fior ne coglie.”
Which means ... “She gathers the fairest flower.”
And what does that mean? No idea. It’s a line from Petrarch. Lost in translation, perhaps.
What’s the meaning of “Crusca”? Bran, strangely enough. They see themselves as linguistic sifters.
Does Italian need sifting? The academicians, sort of a linguistic Ukip, reckon so. They are mortified by the way English words are despoiling the beauties of Italian and are planning a fightback.
Starting when? Today.
Oggi. Well done.
Oggi, oggi, oggi. Less well done.
What’s the plan? The academy’s chief, Claudio Marazzini, has called a summit and is promising to set up a quick-response unit to “go after politicians, bureaucrats and journalists who bring English words into our language”.
What sort of words are worrying them? The communications expert Annamaria Testa, who started the campaign last year, enumerated hundreds, including austerity, chewing gum, download, outsourcing, public relations, politically correct, taskforce, welfare and wishful thinking. Management jargon was especially singled out. The Italian navy then made matters worse by using the slogan “Be cool and join the navy”. The last straw was prime minister Matteo Renzi tabling a “jobs act”.
Instead of? La legge sul lavoro.
Ah, naturalmente. Yep. Anyway, a petition to ban “Italianglo” has attracted 70,000 signatories.
And quite a few signoras, too, presumably? Indeed. The academicians want to dispatch Italians who use hybrid versions of English words to a particularly fiery circle of hell.
Such as? “Footing” for jogging, “baby parking” for creche, “sexy shop” for sex shop, “mister” for football manager, “box” for garage.
Can the academicians win? “It’s too late to do something about ‘car sharing’,” admits Marazzini, “but we need to find Italian words in a hurry for ‘quantitative easing’.”
Alleggerimento quantitativo? OK, we can all use Google Translate.
Not to be confused with: The war on Franglais.
Do mention: Dante, Ariosto, Boccaccio, Calvino, Machiavelli, Pirandello, Umberto Eco.
Don’t mention: Going forward.
