“Analyzing Intercomprehension in the Italian for Speakers of English and Spanish Classroom”

This article discusses an analysis of Italian comprehension levels among students enrolled in first- and second-semester Italian language courses at California State University, Long Beach (CSULB). It presents the first detailed examination of the students’ language background, their initial comprehension levels of Italian, their linguistic and metalinguistic skills in their native language, and their exit levels in Italian in order to: (1) determine the extent to which prior knowledge of Spanish facilitates the comprehension of Italian; (2) create a database to monitor the learning pathways of students enrolled in Italian for Speakers of English and Spanish courses; (3) improve instruction in these multilingual courses. Our thorough analysis, based on empirical evidence, of the varying competencies of these students of Italian (N = 55) has provided us with food for thought about the use of Intercomprehension in the United States and how we can fine-tune the teaching of Italian at CSULB and in similar multilingual contexts, where the presence of heritage Spanish speakers is sizeable (40% in the case of CSULB) and growing.