THE ITALIAN DIRECT PRONOUNS: LET’S HAVE A LOOK!
From the fantastic and magic hat of Italian grammar, today we have fished out a very useful topic to delve into the maze of the rich and varied language that is Italian: THE ITALIAN DIRECT PRONOUNS!
As you can assume from the title, the topic of this article will focus on Italian direct pronouns and how they are important for other two linguistics fields, such as Italian vocabulary and pronunciation.
what are Italian direct pronouns?
Let’s have a look at the classic definition of pronoun: a pronoun is a variable part of the speech used in place of a noun.
In Italian we have direct and indirect pronouns and they can be both direct or indirect and refer to people or things present in reality, named in speech or they can even refer to a sentence.
here is the link to the articles of indirect pronouns
https://italianlesson.it/how-to/italian-pronouns/indirect-italian-pronouns/
Theory is beautiful but how boring it is! That’s why we need examples! But before giving you sentences where Italian direct pronouns are included, we MUST know that direct pronouns are part of the family of Italian objective pronouns.
Let’s see what all the Italian direct pronouns are:
| mi | me |
| ti | you |
| lo, la | him / her / it |
| ci | us |
| vi | you |
| li, le | them |
Now let’s see them in use! For example:
Marco legge un libro: Marco lo legge / Marco reads a book: Marco reads it
In this case, the book (direct object) has been replaced by the Italian direct pronoun LO.
Another example could include the plural, as in this sentence:
Maria vuole sempre mangiare le torte: Maria le vuole sempre mangiare / Maria always wants to eat cakes: Maria always wants to eat them
In this case, cakes (direct object) have been replaced by the Italian direct pronoun LE.
Italian direct pronouns can be “forti” or “deboli”. In this case, an exhaustive list is really useful to better understand this difference! (It doesn’t exist in English)!
| Direct pronoun (strong pronoun shape) | Direct pronoun (weak pronoun shape) |
| me | mi |
| te | ti |
| lui, lei | lo, la |
| noi | ci |
| voi | vi |
| loro | li, le |
We replace weak pronoun shape (that we used in previous examples), with strong pronoun shape:
Le bambine non amano me: le bambine non mi amano / Little girls don’t love me: little girls don’t love me
I professori non vedranno te: i professori non ti vedranno / The professors will not see you: the professors will not see you
Giuseppe compra la giacca: Giuseppe la compra / Giuseppe buys the jacket: Giuseppe buys it
I giudici non considerano noi: i giudici non ci considerano / Judges do not consider us: judges do not consider us
Cristina adorava te e Lucia (voi): Cristina vi adorava / Cristina loved Lucia and you: Cristina loved you
Carlo ha mangiato tutte le mele: Carlo le ha mangiate tutte / Carlo ate all the apples: Carlo ate them all
The strong and weak forms of Italian direct pronouns are both used in written and oral form and the choice of whether or not to use one of the two forms depends greatly on the context.
Today you’ve learned what is a direct pronoun, to what it refers and how to use it correctly in a sentence. Well, now your job is to test what you have just read and learned by doing lots of exercises! Italian grammar is not simple so it is good to start right away!
Don’t forget to add this knowledge to the magnificent puzzle that you are building while learning the Italian language!
Here is another in-depth study:
https://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pronome_personale_in_italiano
See you soon!