Today we will learn some basic expressions to introduce yourself to Italian. We will cover the following main points in this unit:
- Introducing your name
- Exchanging “nice to meet you” after self-introduction
- Asking “Where are you from”
Let’s get started.
Introducing your name
To ask the name of someone, you can say:
- Come ti chiami? (informal)
- Come si chiama? (formal)
And they can reply accordingly:
- Sono [name] – I am ….
- Mi chiamo [name] – I am ….
Exchanging “Nice to meet you” after introducing your name
After introducing names, you usually give a hand shake in exchange to people while saying one of the following expressions:
- Piacere!
- Piacere di conoscerti!
- Piacere di conoscerla! (formal)
Where are you from?
Asking the origin of someone can be expressed in 2 different ways with respect to the main verbs are used, “essere” or “venire”.
Di dove sei? (informal) / Di dov’è? (formal)
Sono [nationality]
Sono di [city/ region/ country]
E.g.
Sono Vietnamita.
Sono italiana.
Sono di Roma.
Da dove vieni?
Vengo da [city]
Vengo dal/dalla [region]
Vengo dalla/dall’ [country]
Note: we must use the article before the names of countries or regions in Italian in the answer with verb “venire”
E.g.
Vengo da Roma.
Vengo dal Lazio.
Vengo dall‘Italia.
Summary
In this tutorial, we learn how to introduce yourself and express kindly greetings in the first meeting. We also learn some useful phrases to ask the origin or provenance where people are from. This question is commonly used in the first meeting to break the ice while you can also prevent making too private questions or you are too nervous to talk. The reason is that each region or province in Italy has its own unique culture as well as dialect and Italian people are very proud of their origin and their province. After Italian give an answer where they are from, they usually keep talking lots of things related to their origin places. And if you have some background about their places, you will communicate easily with them. This is also proven that Italian people are considered very friendly.
If you have any questions about this tutorial, please feel free to write your comments below or send us an email to info@semprelearn.com. We will do our best to reply you as soon as possible. We hope you enjoy this tutorial and remember semprelearn. Always learn new things everyday.
About author
Nguyen has studied in Italy since 2012. She is very passionate in learning Italian by exploring Italy’s rich culture, nature and local products. She finds herself fortunated to study and live in a beautiful country in the middle of the Mediterranean sea where it shares many similarities in culture with her homeland. She, therefore, launched this educational blog semprelearn.com to share her experience in studying Italian and other things.
