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Can any native (or high level) Italian speakers identify the regional accent in this audio clip?

(at 00:34 seconds, and again at 00:47s)

https://tinyurl.com/rthy2zx

Well, I think she's mimicking a regional accent (I think I've heard it before), but she could just be caricaturing that person's way of speaking.

Any help would be appreciated!

  • Welcome to Italian.SE! – Charo Mar 20 '20 at 12:38
  • Triestino??? (I really don't have idea about this). – Charo Mar 20 '20 at 13:03
  • As you noted, it seems that the accent is mimicked, not original, and this does not help. Anyway it is surely from north-east. – linuxfan says Reinstate Monica Mar 20 '20 at 14:39
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    I've said "triestino" because Giuseppe Levi, the one who pronounces these words in the novel, was from Trieste and because some of them seem to be "triestinismi". – Charo Mar 20 '20 at 15:09
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    “Sbrodeghezzi” significa “sbrodolamenti”, “potaci” è “pasticci” (nel senso traslato da quello culinario). La “z” sorda è tipica del triestino. La lettrice non è realmente capace di rendere l'accento. – egreg Mar 20 '20 at 15:47
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    I agree, the dialect accent is of the north-east of Italy, most likely from Friuli, Trieste. Potaci and sbrodeghezzi are terms used both in Friuli and Veneto, as well as the s sound for z. –  Mar 20 '20 at 15:49
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    Since the text being read (Natalia Ginzburg's Lessico famigliare) mentions real-life people, as @Charo says, clearly the speaker intended to mimic, or at leat allude to, the accent from Trieste of Ginzburg's father. – DaG Mar 20 '20 at 17:28
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    Can someone write an answer? – Denis Nardin Mar 20 '20 at 19:14
  • E pensare che nel 1997 spese più di un mese all'ICTP, a Trieste... Ma allora non parlavo una parola di italiano :( :( – Charo Mar 21 '20 at 10:30

1 Answers1

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I've collected in this anwser what said in the comments by @egreg, @Gio and @DaG.

The text being read in this audio is the beginning of the novel Lessico famigliare by Natalia Ginzburg. The character who says these words is Giuseppe Levi, that is, Natalia Ginzburg's father, who was from Trieste. For this reason, the actress tries to mimic the accent from Trieste whenever this character speaks, in which "z" is pronounced /s/.

Some of the words pronounced are "sbrodeghezzi" and "potacci", which, according to the book Novecento plurale: scrittori e lingua by Maria Antonietta Grignani, belong to Triestine dialect and, according to Luigi Fontanella in the article "Natalia Ginzburg between Fiction and Memory: A Reading of Le voci della sera and Lessico famigliare", published in the book Natalia Ginzburg: A Voice of the Twentieth Century (University of Toronto Press), were used by Giuseppe Levi to convey the meaning of things of bad taste.

Charo
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  • I've just collected the contents of the comments in this post. I've made this answer community-wiki so that it can be improved by other users. You can also write another answer if you prefer: this one can be eventually deleted. – Charo Apr 16 '20 at 21:31
  • @egreg: Would you like to add an explanation about the meaning of these two words (and whatever you want) to this post? – Charo Apr 16 '20 at 22:05
  • Tutto giusto, ma non ci vuole una pubblicazione scientifica per capire che il padre di Natalia Ginzburg usava sbrodeghezzi e potacci in quel senso: lo dice chiaro e tondo il libro: “Se inzuppavamo il pane nella salsa, gridava: – Non leccate i piatti! Non fate sbrodeghezzi! non fate potacci! / Sbrodeghezzi e potacci erano, per mio padre, anche i quadri moderni, che non poteva soffrire” etc. :) – DaG Sep 24 '20 at 19:26
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    Sono stata a rileggere parte del Lessico famigliare e hai completamente ragione, @DaG. Inoltre, c'è una grande tenerezza nella caratterizzazione del padre (e anche della madre) di Natalia Ginzburg. – Charo Oct 08 '20 at 19:48