As part of the initiatives promoted by the Italian Embassy in Hanoi for the 21st Week of the Italian Language in the World, the new Vietnamese language edition of “L’Inferno” will be presented on Saturday 23 October, in the presence of Casa Italia and online, in the translation of Nguyen Van Hoan, illustrious historian of Vietnamese and Italian literature and the first Vietnamese citizen to be awarded the OMRI Knighthood in 2002.
In addition to this cultural proposal, realised in collaboration with the Vietnam Academy of Social Sciences and the publishing house “Social Sciences”, on the same occasion the special issue on Dante Alighieri of the magazine “Vietnam Literature Review” will be presented, published in collaboration with the Vietnam Institute of Literature, with interesting in-depth studies and contributions by Vietnamese and Italian scholars on the significance of Dante’s work in the world and Vietnam.
The study of the Italian language in Vietnam is widespread at the university level, thanks to two Departments of Italian Studies at the prestigious Universities of Hanoi and USSH in Ho Chi Minh City. They offer four-year degree courses in Italian language and culture with over 110 graduates per year. Since 2019, a curricular course of Italian as a second foreign language has also been running at the FLSS Language High School in Hanoi.
The programme organised in Vietnam for the Week of the Italian Language in the World), running until 24 October, included the installation of a multimedia app on (www.inferno5.com/vi/tour/); the presentation of the conclusion of the educational project “From Dante to the Malaysian and Vietnamese Poets: the idea of love beyond borders” by the University of Hanoi and Malaya University of Kuala Lumpur; a quiz for students on Facebook on Italian culture by an initiative of the Italianistics Department of the University of Hanoi; a webinar on “Dante 700”, in Vietnamese language, organised by the Italianistics Department of the University of Hanoi; the conclusion of the competition with prizes for students on Dante Alighieri and the Italian language (Department of Linguistics and Italian Literature of the USSH University of Ho Chi Minh City) and the competition “Il Cicerone – The best tourist guide” (Department of Italian Studies of the University of Hanoi). In addition, the Italian language course for Vietnamese police officers is planned to begin on 28 October, in cooperation with the Ministry of Public Security and Uni-Italia Vietnam.