Language invasion 意大利语受到侵略

The Italian Prime Minister is very fond of English words and phrases.

媒体英语会带大家一起学习 BBC 撰稿人在报道世界大事时常用到的单词和短语。

一位意大利著名作家警告说意大利语正在受到英语语言的破坏，这是由于现如今越来越多的意大利人在日常用语中夹杂众多英语单词。犯罪小说作家安德烈亚•卡米雷利说此举是意大利正在遭受“毁灭性殖民化”的象征，意大利总理马里奥•蒙蒂应首先受到批评。请听 BBC 驻罗马记者 Alan Johnston发回的报道。

Andrea Camilleri is a literary celebrity in Italy. And he's best known abroad for his novels featuring his brilliant fictional creation, the Sicilian detective, Inspector Montalbano.

But the author is worried about the health of the language in which he works. Speaking earlier this week he took issue with the country's politicians for peppering their speeches with English words and phrases. Terms like welfare, governance, devolution, and even election day.

The author said that Prime Minister, Mario Monti, was a leading offender. And it's true that Mr Monti does indeed frequently reach for English terminology. Here's an example from his first speech to Parliament. Listen to how he just drops in the English phrase best practices:

Clip of Mario Monti speaking Italian

And in the very next breath, he's at it again, sliding in that grim English term spending review:

Clip of Mario Monti speaking Italian

Mr Camilleri said Mr Monti's habit was just part of what he called an "awful tradition" in Italian public life. Not enough, he said, was being done to take care of the national language.

And he gave a classic example. He said that when he served on a jury for a prize given by the Italian state broadcaster at the Venice Film Festival, he was dismayed to find that the official language of the judging would be English.