Conference Italophony and the role of public service media
On Saturday, 7 May 2022, the Forum St. Katharinen in St. Gallen hosted the conference L’italofonia e il ruolo del servizio pubblico dei media organised by the CORSI, with the Forum per l’italiano in Svizzera. The conference follows the publication of the report “La posizione dell’Italiano in Svizzera: uno sguardo sul periodo 2012- 2020 attraverso alcuni indicatori”, commissioned by the Forum per l’italiano in Svizzera from the Linguistic Observatory of Italian-speaking Switzerland (OLSI) and the Department of Formation and Learning (SUPSI-DFA) with the collaboration of the Pedagogical High School of Graubünden (PHGR).At the conference – which was attended by over 100 people – Matteo Casoni, co-author of the study, and Diego Erba, coordinator of the Forum, emphasised that Italian is not confined to Italian-speaking Switzerland alone: 33% of the population claim to be partially proficient in Italian, and the largest number of Italian speakers live beyond the Gotthard.The conference, which opened with a video greeting from Ignazio Cassis, president of the Confederation, was attended by Luigi Pedrazzini, president CORSI, various Italian-speaking personalities from the Swiss political, diplomatic and academic world, Gilles Marchand, Director General of SRG SSR and Mario Timbal, Director of RSI.
2012-2020 Rapporto La posizione dell’italiano in svizzera (italian)
Four round tables followed during the day – Plurilingualism in Switzerland – challenges and opportunities for Italian in Switzerland; The health of Italian: promotion and valorisation in the public service media; Italian beyond the Alps: expectations of professors and schools with regard to the public service media; A public service radio and television for young people: what does RSI do for young people and what expectations does it meet?On Friday 6 May, the conference was preceded by a seminar for young people who took part in practical activities during which they were confronted with new and old communication tools: particular attention was given to digital communication and fake news. Thanks to the support of Professor Eleonora Rothenberger, the Cantonal School am Burggraben in St. Gallen, the Cantonal School of Kreuzlingen, the Teacher Training College of Chur, the Teacher Training College of St. Gallen and the Teacher Training College of Thurgau were involved.
CORSI proposed the project Sarà vero? (Will it be true?) focusing on online fake news, while RSI proposed the production of a video for SPAM (a format of news, current affairs and entertainment videos dedicated to young people).
The participants in the conference of 7 May 2022 made the following recommendations to the federal, cantonal and municipal authorities, as well as to SRG SSR and the other Italian-speaking media present beyond the Alps:
1. SRG SSR, through its channels, enhances the Italian language and culture with services and programmes aimed at the Italian-speaking presence in Switzerland. This task involves all radio and television broadcasters and not only RSI, Radiotelevisione svizzera di lingua italiana. However, the latter must take a more active role in programming services and content aimed at Italophones beyond the Alps, and not just at the Italian-speaking Swiss audience;
In the educational sphere, the federal, cantonal and municipal authorities must pay more attention to the Italian language offer in compulsory schools, giving this teaching a more solid status than the current optional language offer. At the high school level, the principle that Italian must remain a fundamental subject offered compulsorily to students is reaffirmed, while in the professional sector, the Italian language must be given greater emphasis, particularly in the commercial sector, also with reference to the existing relations between Switzerland and Italy;
3. the Italian professorships at universities and universities of applied sciences (including the pedagogical high schools) perform an important educational and cultural promotion task. They are a distinctive sign of our multilingualism and it is essential that the public service media do their utmost to give them visibility. The role of these institutions also needs to be more widely recognised by the responsible authorities. In this context, their inappropriate downsizing must be avoided, as has unfortunately already happened with the professorships;
4. the Italian-speaking media in Switzerland, and in particular the public service media, must take greater account of the new forms of communication aimed at young audiences, offering captivating programmes in response to their expectations and interests.
Source: Corsi