"La bambina morta è sua figlia."
Translation:The dead girl is her daughter.
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I don't know what Duo's obsession with death is about, but this is one very dark sentence!
Duolingo seems to draw a lot of their later sentences from detective novels. Earlier sentences seem to come from children's books. I have now read two Italian gialli (mysteries) and I do think they're a good place to start--especially since Duo gets you ready for them. :-)
Could you recommend some titles or authors, please, GregHullender? I know people who are learning English tend to read Agatha Christie rather than the more modern murder mysteries (e.g. Ian Rankin) because the vocabulary is more formal. Do you do choose those sort of novels in Italian?
I recommend reading Umberto Eco in Italian if you really want an easy start. Oh, sorry, I meant to say, "If you want to discourage yourself and give up." I should have started small. O, hubris! You have brought me low again!
It's been five years, but thanks for this. Bookmarked!
For my first book in Italian, I think I'll look for a biography of Silvio Berlusconi. It's got to be fun, lively and exciting.
1863
You can also practice by reading magazine articles...on my FB page I follow Italian magazines on subjects I enjoy reading about such as music, film, and fashion. My son reads recording engineering articles. The fun part is reading the comments on the articles by regular Italians!
I subscribe to a beautiful magazine called Panoramitalia. They mail them to Ottawa and Montreal, but it may be available online. It is amazing because most articles are in English, French and Italian, reflecting our beautiful city of Montreal. So you don't have to keep looking up words, etc. The columns of the articles are side by side in each of the 3 languages. Some are just in Italian as well. The articles are mostly about Italy and Italian people. The magazine is free around the 2 cities mentioned or it costs $30 Canadian for 3 years. Go to www.panoramitalia.com. But magazines are great because the articles are shorter and reflect real life.
I just went to have a look. I had no idea this existed! Thank you so much : )
In class we had to read a short giallo that was called Mistero a Roma, but I don't know if it's widely available, it was given to us from a textbook sort of format...
Pretty cheery :-( To illustrate the adjective "morto" DL couldn't have written "The 110 year old DEAD grandfather with 50 grandchildren and 30 great grandchildren, having died after consuming a large bowl of gnocchi and a bottle of chianti, with a town-full of friends and family present, lived a long and happy life and will be missed by most if not all of Italy and greater parts of Europe?" Uffa!
- 2042
Or if it's a sentence about me: "Police discovered a dead body yesterday but have as of yet been unable to identify the sex of the individual as, according to first hand testimony by an office at the scene of the ordeal, the corpse appears to have been promptly consumed by the owner's 13 kittens." In fact, translating that sentence should be the very first sentence everyone is presented with when they do their very first Duo lesson. Without hints.
Kate...I love your sentence....and it would allow DL to introduce other fun sentences involving cats, which have a huge fan base among foreign language students, especially lovers of italian: Gatti appassionati del mondo: unite!
- 2042
Throw in that fact that the body was found in the fridge of a girl with way too many boyfriends during December next to a boot that appears to have been harboring a snake at one point and you got a common narrative in DL .
Not to mention the fact that one of said signorina's boyfriends is a former museum manager who spent time in jail along with his sister for stealing a tiger from the zoo and is now selling refrigerators into which people can comfortably enter.
- 2042
We're on Duo. Duo should be it's own little form of insanity. One that involves things dying (plumbers, guys, the husband). Like if something makes you go "❤❤❤ did I just read/translate?" it should be called getting Duolingo'd.
Good pt on your last post - earning a lingot! Ciao - I'm going to have a glass of oil now to help me wake up. Oh, and my horse is getting hungry for his morning rice.
Priceless!! After the gnocchi & chianti, he must have had a smile on his face. :-)
I agree with people here... this is a depressing sentence! Along with the "Sono uomini morti" I got a few questions back.
Actually the phrase "they are dead men" is a very common expression that doesn't mean the men are dead. The expression means that if those people act in a certain way, they will be figuratively dead. For example, if a group of people decide to go to their micro managing or inflexible boss and suggest a different way of doing things or criticize his/her ideas - one would predict out loud :oh boy, they are dead men. Very common, very useful expression.
This is a horrible sentence. People have no heart. I lost my daughter and time after time I get examples such as the one discussed here.
Ludo, I agree. It's probably not so much that the folks at DL have no heart, it's more likely they just weren't thinking. Report it. I'm so sorry for your loss.
I'm so sorry to hear of your loss. You are correct, it is insensitive at best.
- 307
Generally, "bambina" is used until age 12-13, which then becomes "ragazza" unitl marriageable (27- 30) which then becomes "donna" (woman); similar range for men. Of course, "bambina/o" can be used to describe one's sweetheart or child ("La bambina mia si è sposata!" My little girl got married!) or as derisive term for an immature individual ("Lui è nulla ma un gran bambino!" - He's nothing but a big baby).
Because the girl is dead, we would say, the dead girl "was" her daughter as well.
- 2042
Unless she just died and the mother found at the crime scene that the girl was killed by her lover in a murder-suicide. At which point the dead girl "is" her daughter. Slightly relevant to today's events BTW (in the U.S.).
- 2252
Hey, may you avoid these gloomy sentences please??? Think about the motivation of people... If you do insist, you may establish a separate topic named 'Sad things in our live' for such 'optimistic' clauses..
I hate being forced to write and translate this sentence over and over. I wish they have it removed.
Too sad for me too. There are many other ways to teach these words than to remind people of losing their daughters.
My gosh...why Duolingo doesn't change this sentence? It's so hard just to think about it....
Good grief. Why the morbid sentences? Is it to push us to purchase the paid version?
- 1548
You know? I used Italian at work in Europe for a few years and I think that they'd probably be more subtle than this. The French would use the word décédée for the girl in an article. A little euphemism wouldn't be uncalled for here. But I've got kids so that one sounds very cold.
- 1436
'Bambina' has often been translated by Duo as "baby girl", but this time it wouldn't accept it...
ma che siete cretini, ma perche fate questi esempi da imparare? non e' per niente gentile (come stiamo studiando sta parola in queste lezioni). Fate altri esempi, imbecili.
cjsedin: I see your point, but the sentence isn't saying, "the girl died" it's using 'morta' as an adjective. The dead girl IS his/her daughter. Present tense.
This translation... while it's understandable and technically correct... it sounds very callous and rude. We'd usually talk around such an emotional loss -- "The deceased is her daughter." or even just "She's the mother."
When coming up with coping skills, definitely don't add Duolingo to your list of things to get your mind off mourning the death of your child. Ffs.
Isn't it bad enough to use it once in a lesson, but using it twice is really inexcusable.
Must we really have sentences like this? Hardly a conversation starter.
Well this is pretty grim. I remember when the lessons were more light-hearted and the only thing that was dead was the ant in the sugar.
But then again, nothing beats 'ero morto' a few lessons earlier. Applicable to zombies perhaps.
Sadly/grimly enough too many people love sugar enough to eat themselves to death just the same (in present day), though it just might take 10+ years to do it.
Sì. Even more grim than 'Sei Morto.' that I came across a few moments ago. All that needs is an exclamation mark, to sound like a line from a cheap Gangster movie.
- 1892
I can only hope that it was a random adjective generator creating the unfortunate sentence.
I'm "happy" to find that all of the discussion here is this morbid sentence. Duo, really.
Grazie, to all for further reading suggestions , great help as is reading so many questions and answers.
I had the same question! After looking into it a bit, I think that if it was saying "your daughter" instead of "his/her/its daughter", "sua" would be capitalized ("Sua figlia" vs. "sua figlia".)
There are so many dark comments in duolingo. Is the writer trying to tell us that he or she is a murderer?
Read the post above of the man whose daughter died. There are better illustrations of the word.
Why not dead baby, instead of dead girl, as figlia implies baby girl?
We are learning a language!! Knqqowing how to express the dark side is just as important as knowing how to express the light and flowery side. Anyone who is upset by this sentence should never read a newspaper.
- 2545
Yes a grim sentence but it makes us sit up and pay closer attention than we might otherwise do.
It's a startling sentence, at least in English, but I have to admit, I admire its unadorned candor.
- 2883
... siete ossessionati da questo aggettivo ... o vi divertite così tanto a farci fare scongiuri ... su scongiuri ... su scongiuri (avete capito a cosa alludo ... vero ???) mentre facciamo l'esercizio ??? ... finitela ... non siete né divertenti ... né particolarmente spiritosi ... lo scherzo è bello finché dura poco ... e lo si può chiamare scherzo ... quando ridono tutti ... non quando ride solo chi lo fa ... in questo caso si chiama VIOLENZA
We have to learn to understand and say everything in Italian. This is part of the everyday life.
Theres a lot of death and racemixing being pushed on duolingo. Whats your agenda, you degenerate owl?
Whatever happened to 'La plume da ma tante'? Ah, yes another language I didn't quite master. Hope i never need to use this..
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I don't think this is a good exercise for people who have daughters who have died. Especially since it is so repetitive.
- 16
Nothing wrong with learning the word for "to die" but why repeat it multiple times in every lesson and almost always with people, men, children? So, teach the word and move on. But if Duolingo just wants to be morbid, fine, but don't thrust it upon everyone else.
Why a "dead child" has to be used as en example to learn a language? What a twisted mind of yours, for real!
This is especially somber now that they've added jolly characters who appear to be speaking the sentences..
Horrible sentence. Insensitive especially to a mother who has lost a baby.
The Italian Duolingo has a lot of sentences with death, Why? "La gente moriva per strada". "La bambina morta era sua figlia". "No, lui non è morto", etcetera, etcetera. WHat's going on? Dark!
- 507
I am finding this obsession with death rather upsetting. Duo Lingo needs to find something a little more... uplifting to aid our learning. As a retired teacher, I would never have given my students something so depressing. it does not encourage on going learning. Sorry, rant over... currently isolating with the dreaded Covid and feeling somewhat sorry for myself!