CORSICAN
‘Good day’ in the Corsican language is bunghjornu. ‘Thank you’ is grazie. Bread is pane. Dog is cane. ‘Best wishes!’ is pace i salute! If this all sounds suspiciously like Italian to you, you’re not off the
mark. The Corsican language – Corsu in Corsican – is descended from, and still related to the Tuscan language that formed the basis of standard Italian. If you think Corsican is Italian or a dialect of Italian, you might nevertheless do well to keep this view to yourself. Though Corsicans are
too good-natured to want to punish innocent foreigners for the hasty conclusions they draw on only partial evidence, many Corsicans are committed to the view that Corsican is not a dialect, and
still less Italian itself, but a distinct language.
It’s not recommended that you make any effort to communicate with Corsicans in Corsican. As Alexandra Jaffe says in her excellent Ideologies in Action: Language Politics in Corsica, Corsican is the language of the Corsican heart and hearth. French ‘commands the domain of the formal, the authoritative, the instrumental and intellectual’. You may think you are being ingratiating if you attempt a few words of Corsican. More likely, however, you’ll be perceived as patronising or condescending,
as if the person you are addressing didn’t speak French perfectly well. You may be perceived to be baiting the person you are addressing on what is in Corsica a heavily charged political issue. Finally, again Corsican being the language of the Corsican heart and hearth, you
may be perceived as intruding on personal and private space – as if, invited into a stranger’s living room, you proceeded immediately into their bedroom. Another way to put it is that presuming to
address a stranger in Corsican is akin to the liberty you take in addressing a stranger in the familiar pan-Mediterranean ‘tu’ form rather than in the more respectful ‘vous’, ‘lei’ or ‘usted’ form.
If you speak French or Italian, stick with that. Dedicated Corsophiles can enrol in language courses at the Università di Corsica Pasqual Paoli in Corte or those offered by the association Esse 04 95 33 12 00) in Bastia.
‘Good day’ in the Corsican language is bunghjornu. ‘Thank you’ is grazie. Bread is pane. Dog is cane. ‘Best wishes!’ is pace i salute! If this all sounds suspiciously like Italian to you, you’re not off the
mark. The Corsican language – Corsu in Corsican – is descended from, and still related to the Tuscan language that formed the basis of standard Italian. If you think Corsican is Italian or a dialect of Italian, you might nevertheless do well to keep this view to yourself. Though Corsicans are
too good-natured to want to punish innocent foreigners for the hasty conclusions they draw on only partial evidence, many Corsicans are committed to the view that Corsican is not a dialect, and
still less Italian itself, but a distinct language.
It’s not recommended that you make any effort to communicate with Corsicans in Corsican. As Alexandra Jaffe says in her excellent Ideologies in Action: Language Politics in Corsica, Corsican is the language of the Corsican heart and hearth. French ‘commands the domain of the formal, the authoritative, the instrumental and intellectual’. You may think you are being ingratiating if you attempt a few words of Corsican. More likely, however, you’ll be perceived as patronising or condescending,
as if the person you are addressing didn’t speak French perfectly well. You may be perceived to be baiting the person you are addressing on what is in Corsica a heavily charged political issue. Finally, again Corsican being the language of the Corsican heart and hearth, you
may be perceived as intruding on personal and private space – as if, invited into a stranger’s living room, you proceeded immediately into their bedroom. Another way to put it is that presuming to
address a stranger in Corsican is akin to the liberty you take in addressing a stranger in the familiar pan-Mediterranean ‘tu’ form rather than in the more respectful ‘vous’, ‘lei’ or ‘usted’ form.
If you speak French or Italian, stick with that. Dedicated Corsophiles can enrol in language courses at the Università di Corsica Pasqual Paoli in Corte or those offered by the association Esse 04 95 33 12 00) in Bastia.