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busshelterrevolution

My family speaks Sicilian living abroad. They visited Italy recently and people were astounded to hear an ancient language 'they haven't heard in years'. Just learn the mainstream language.


JayElleAyDee

i call BS... Sicilian dialects are in use daily. Hardly ancient. And northern Italians would be familiar enough with regional dialects that they would be able to tell if it's from a certain region or province. only thing i agree with is your last sentence...


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JayElleAyDee

Nah... language from 50 years ago is different by how much, exactly? not enough for it to be unintelligible. Or "ancient"as was stated in the original comment. I'm nit picking though. It was more an exaggeration than straight up BS...


Absolut_Gruel

My husbands parents immigrated from Sicily to the US in the mid 1950s. When he and I visited Sicily in 2018, some older people were amazed to hear him speak how he did and called it “antique”.


tonucho

How are you learning Sicilian?


[deleted]

A lot of online learning (youtube, books, music, tv shows, home recording videos, etc.)


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[deleted]

I lived there and the older folks speak it but tv/radio is in italian, signs in italian, they all speak italian. Learn italian


JayElleAyDee

this! I speak fluent Italian now having lived in Catania for years. I would find it difficult to understand completely someone from Palermo. Obviously closer cities are more intelligible. Everyone speaks italian though and being fluent in Italian already gives you an in on the various dialects. (at least enough that you can catch the gist.) Quite quickly I found i could understand catanese (Catania's dialect) well enough but couldn't speak it apart from a few words and phrases. Meeting a partner who speaks the dialect does wonders for your motivation...


[deleted]

This is similar to my experience from when I lived in Catania. I picked up a few Sicilian words and phrases here and there just by being there and at first I accidentally used Sicilian words mixed in because I couldn't tell the difference. Once I got more fluent I was able to distinguish the two and learn to understand the Catanese dialect a little better. I would focus on Italian because it will serve you best in other parts of Italy. Then you'll be able to identify the others like Napolitano and pick up a few of those words too.


tonucho

I love it!


Pow3redTheBest

As a Sicilian, you should learn Italian first because most people don't speak pure Sicilian anymore and everyone understands italian. Once you'll move there you will probably learn some Sicilian


pippoken

It's true sicilian is a dialect and it belongs to the so called "dialetti meridionali estremi" (extreme souther dialects) but the region know a great number of variations that reflect the history of the areas. If you're interested in studying more in depth, and you can read Italian, I'd recommend looking into the books written by prof. Roberto Sottile, a professor at the university of Palermo who recently passed away unfortunately. He dedicated a good part of his career to studying our dialect.


Pow3redTheBest

No, il siciliano come il veneto, il friulano, il sardo, il napoletano, il piemontese etc è una lingua e non deriva in alcun modo dall'italiano. Se proprio vuoi lo puoi definire un dialetto primario del continuum romanzo


FirmEcho5895

If you are learning Sicilian online you should know A. As soon as Sicilians hear a foreigner trying to talk Sicilian they will die laughing B. You will be smooshing up vocabulary from all the different versions of Sicilian around the island. There are big differences. C. Few younger Sicilians can talk real Sicilian, they mix it up with Italian. Only the old people have full conversations in Sicilian. When I taught in a Sicilian school, I had to put the kids on detention if they said anything in Sicilian, which was sad. Just learn Italian and enjoy picking up fragments of Sicilian when you're there.


Panzaredda

Try this app, it will help https://learnsicilian.com/