Italian Language
Eritrea, Ethiopia, Libya, and Somalia conserve Italian as a colonial legacy; Somalia had Italian as its cultural language in universities up to 1991; however, the Italian language remains unknown to over 95% of the population. In Libya, Italians were forced to leave the country after its independence.
In all of these countries, the only one that most preserves Italian is Eritrea, that has only one Italian-language school remaining, with 470 pupils yearly. The name of the only Italian-language school in Eritrea is Scuola Italiana di Asmara. Other countries that also preserve Italian are Libya and Somalia; Italian remains an important language in the education and economic sectors in Libya, although Arabic becomes the sole official language of the country when dictatorship of Muammar Gaddafi ruled; Italian remains spoken as a second language by the elderly and educated in Somalia and is also used as one of second languages in the new Federal Government of Somalia.
Read more about this topic: Romance-speaking Africa
Famous quotes containing the words italian and/or language:
“Semantically, taste is rich and confusing, its etymology as odd and interesting as that of “style.” But while style—deriving from the stylus or pointed rod which Roman scribes used to make marks on wax tablets—suggests activity, taste is more passive.... Etymologically, the word we use derives from the Old French, meaning touch or feel, a sense that is preserved in the current Italian word for a keyboard, tastiera.”
—Stephen Bayley, British historian, art critic. “Taste: The Story of an Idea,” Taste: The Secret Meaning of Things, Random House (1991)
“The great pines stand at a considerable distance from each other. Each tree grows alone, murmurs alone, thinks alone. They do not intrude upon each other. The Navajos are not much in the habit of giving or of asking help. Their language is not a communicative one, and they never attempt an interchange of personality in speech. Over their forests there is the same inexorable reserve. Each tree has its exalted power to bear.”
—Willa Cather (1873–1947)