( November 17th 2016) “The greatest satisfaction is to transform what is seen in many countries of the world as a stereotype in a cultural aspect, fundamental linguistic ability for understanding Italy and Italians. Most of unfamiliar to nonverbal communication non-Italians, understand a little or nothing of our gestures and see this whole movement as pure exuberance and as a folkloric aspect. What I do at every meeting is to show that we are talking about one of the most articulated and fascinating linguistic codes in the world “: Luca Vullo (www.lucavullo.it, on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram) is just fresh from the success of the first part of his United States tour, ended at Santa Clara University after being a guest of Italian Institute of Culture in Chicago and other prestigious universities in the city (Loyola, Illinois and De Paul). Among documentaries and workshops, ), waiting for new appointments in the US at the beginning of 2017, the director and author has shown to West Coast audience the secrets of Italian gestures (continuing the path started in 2011 with the docudrama “The voice of the body”) and our contemporary emigration (his latest production is the documentary titled “Influx” about Italian emigration in the UK. “After the surprise, charm and curiosity to know more, but also the desire to understand and make better use of Italian gestures to improve communication abilities – he says -. I simply present them this linguistic code in a pleasant way, fresh and fun and frankly the result is guaranteed. ” A code that can generate various “misunderstandings” with foreigners: “Although many are able to imitate and reproduce the Italian gestures, in 90% of cases they do not know the meaning – explains Vullo -. The most famous gesture is certainly that of ‘what do you want?’ Or ‘What are you saying?’. People remain shocked when they discover that according to the speech and the context as well as the expression of the face, the same gesture can take on many meanings. The other gesture that I see often reproduced is the one that communicate good referred to food, with the swirling of the finger on the cheek and in that case I ‘m amused to show how many things we can communicate only with a finger movement”. There is a very close relationship among the evolution of gesture and of Italian language, especially among younger generations: “dialect and language are closely associated with gestures – said the director -. Clearly today is being a big change due to use of new technologies and influence of movies and TV series. A striking case for me was working with Bologna middle schools. It was incredible to see that none of the students used more typically Italian gesture but they were all influenced by the American. I have reported them to rediscover the gestures of parents and grandparents. It was an ‘old style’ experience but it was important to rediscover their roots. Do not forget thah also family education and social influence of a certain part of Italy, often prohibit use of gestures considered vulgar and popular item used by low social class. ” At recent Italian Language States General held in Florence, was highlighted that Italian is the fourth most studied language in the world. From his special observatory, Luca Vullo perceives a growing interest in our country and its culture ” I work a lot with universities and schools in different parts of the world and I know how much love and interest ther is for Italian language. It is considered one of the most beautiful languages in the world and everyone loves his musicality. The problem is that its almost useless in work’s world. In fact there not many opportunities for those who study Italian, apart some specific areas related to teaching, tourism, art and culture, cultural mediation and translations career. This situation does not stimulate students who are forced by our contemporary society to find a job as quickly as possible to make money without thinking of the things that we like and nourish our souls. I think we should work a lot in this direction to encourage even more the study of our wonderful language “. (Roc)
