"But you are not Italian, you are Krauts" Hello to all friends welcome to this new
video as you can see today we have a special guest: Fatma. Fatma is here with us today to tell
us a very interesting story of one of the Italian regions: Trentino Alto
Adige. Hi Fatma how are you and where are you from? I'm fine thanks, I was born and raised in Italy;
when I was one year old I moved from Saronno which is in Lombardy, in Alto Adige to
Merano. Trentino Alto Adige is a region with special status in northern Italy and
is divided between the autonomous provinces of Trento and Bolzano where Trentino belongs to the province
of Trento and Alto Adige belongs to the province of Bolzano. My parents have Kurdish origins
so besides speaking Italian, German and English I also speak Kurdish and Turkish. You have
assumed that you speak German, but why? In South Tyrol, German is an official language;
I always attended German school and I also had classmates who could not speak Italian
well so it is not obvious that everyone speaks Italian in South Tyrol even though we all live
in Italy. For example, in Bolzano, 70 percent of the population belongs to the
Italian linguistic group while in Merano, where I live, half of the population belongs to the German linguistic group
and the other half belongs to the Italian linguistic group. You said that you
attended German school: but then Italian is also taught? Yes, Italian as a second language is taught
in German schools because they give so much importance to the fact that
we integrate into Italian society because we live in Italy and we need to know this language
but in Italian schools they don't give much importance to teaching German as well. it is a
bit rare to find someone who has attended Italian school who also speaks German well (/ perfectly)
. And what language group do you belong to: German or Italian language group? In
South Tyrol when you turn 18 you have to declare which language group you belong to; I belong
to the German language group because I always attended German school and I speak German better
than Italian. To work in the public you must have a bilingualism license: it is difficult to
find a job in South Tyrol if you do not know both languages, you must be very lucky
to find a job if you only know German or Italian. Now we come to the crucial question
of the video: but why in South Tyrol, which is part of Italy, is German spoken? Because in the past South
Tyrol was part of Austria. At the end of the First World War, with
the defeat of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, this territory passed to Italy and thus
the Italianization during Fascism also began . What is meant by "Italianization"? By
Italianization we mean that in that period the South Tyroleans could no longer speak German,
they also had to change their surnames and have Italian surnames or even names,
they could no longer teach German in schools and if they did they always did it in secret
because at In the end, the South Tyroleans cared about their traditions but it was forbidden to live their
culture. In this period Mussolini also gave advantages to the Italians who moved to
Alto Adige to Italianise the whole territory, for example they could have a nice house or a
nice job. Then there was also the option where the South Tyroleans had to decide if they wanted to fight
with Germany, with Hitler, or if they wanted to stay in Italy but they had to Italianize, which means
that they had to change their name, speak Italian and forget all their culture. Living in a
multilingual context, how is the coexistence between the two linguistic groups? In the past there
were certainly conflicts between the two linguistic groups but today, from what I know,
there are no longer these problems because you know how to live together but every now
and then there is an Italian who says: " you are not Italian, you are Krauts ". Warning:
the term "crucco" is used in a derogatory or ironic way towards German-speaking
people . Or there are South Tyroleans who do not feel Italian say: "no,
we are Austrians" sometimes it happens. It is very interesting to know that over time the two
language groups have begun to coexist and appreciate each other. But you Fatma, knowing all these
languages, don't you get confused? Yes, of course I get confused! Sometimes I also make mistakes in Italian or
German, but there is also another language in South Tyrol: Ladin! Ladin is an official language
in Italy which is spoken in South Tyrol, Veneto, Friuli Venezia Giulia and Trentino.
Once I met a lady who told me about her story: she was Ladin
and told me that she felt like a foreigner at school. When she moved from Val
Gardena to Bolzano she felt like a foreigner even though she is Italian. So let's say a lady
very faithful to her origins. One last question: in your region are road signs and all
signs in Italian or German? The road signs are in both languages:
both German and Italian. Great Fatma, thank you for this great interview and
for releasing so much useful and interesting information, it was a pleasure to have
you here with us! Thanks to you Giulia and thanks to you who have watched the video! Bye Bye!