Springtime Italian Language and Cultural Resources in DC

Soon the city streets will be filled with Washingtonians and tourists walking underneath the warmth of the sun's rays. Among the melange of foreign languages, you will assuredly hear the Italian language rolling melodically off the tongues of Italian tourists, ex-pats, foreign nations, and Italophiles alike. If you're like me, you may wish you were able to confidently engage yourself in one of those Italian conversations. As an on-again, off-again student of la lingua italiana, I know that the next best thing to total immersion is class room instruction combined with practical use. Lucky for us in the District, whether you are a novice or a maestro, we have many great resources where you can go to absorb the language and culture if il bel paese.

Classroom Instruction

For classroom instruction, we have Casa Italiana Language School and the Italian Cultural Society of Washington, DC (ICS). Both offer basic, intermediate and advanced language courses for adults and also classes per bambini. In addition, Casa Italiana offers a wider range of new cultural courses, such as Introduction to Opera, Ceramics, Wine tasting, and even lectures on Italian politics and current events!

Prices range from $235 for a 10 week course at ICS, and $305 for a 12 week course at Casa Italiana. If you are a member of ICS, you can receive $20 off the tuition of some courses. Until March 29, 2011, Casa Italiana has a great promotion: if you enroll for the Spring/Summer semester, you will automatically be entered for a chance to win a FREE course at Casa Italiana! Other enrollees will also have the chance to win a free wine tasting event, a free cooking class with Casa Italiana's resident chef, or a free italian language book. Loyal Casa Italiana students can receive a 5% discount if this Spring/Summer session is your third consecutive semester studying there.

Conversational Groups

DC also has great places to test your language skills. Meet-up.com, the biggest on-line community of local groups has two in the DC metro area: The Washington, DC Italian Language Group and Piazza Italia. Both groups offer opportunities for Italian language conversation for all levels. The Washington, DC Italian Language Meet-up also offers weekly language workshops and monthly Cineforum Italiano.

Also don't forget, thanks to La Dolce DC there are a myriad of events going on throughout the city where you can test your knowledge of Italian language and culture!