Do you know how to say “you’re right” in Italian?
As we started talking about last week, Italian has some funny expressions with “have”. In this lesson, you’ll learn a really important one: to be right, or literally, to “have reason”.
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Vocabulary: How to say "you're right" in Italian
- Hai ragione = you’re right
- Lo so = I know
- Ho sempre ragione = I’m always right
- Ha ragione = he/she’s right
- Abbiamo ragione = we’re right
- Avete ragione = youPlural are right
- Hanno ragione = they’re right
Quiz: How to say "you're right" in Italian
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Flashcards: How to say "you're right" in Italian
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Transcript: How to say "you're right" in Italian
Please note, this is not a word for word transcript.
Katie: Ciao a tutti e benvenuti a 5 Minute Italian. I’m Katie
Matteo: And I’m Matteo, ciao!
K: Last week, we started talking about some funny expressions with “have” in Italian. For example, in Italian, we don’t say “I am hungry”. We say “I have hunger”.
M: Ho fame
And I don’t say “I am my age” for example, I am thirty-six, I say I “have” my age: Ho trenta-sei anni
K: In this episode, we’re going to look at another really useful phrase that follows the same logic.
K: Let’s listen to a mini conversation that happens often in our house...
Hai ragione
M: Lo so, ho sempre ragione
Whenever I say to Matteo “you’re right” (hai ragione) he always likes to reply with:
M: “I know, I’m always right”.
K: That’s why I try not to say it that often. To say you’re right, Italians literally say “you have reason”.
M: Hai ragione
K: Word for word, that’s:
M:
Hai = you have
Ragione = reason
K: So thats you have, “hai” spelt h, a, i, but the h is silent.
M: Hai
K: Then ragione, spelt r-a-g-i-o-n-e
M: Ragione
K: Let’s break down the reply too:
M:
Lo so = I know
Ho = I have
Sempre = always
Ragione = reason
K: So to say “I’m right” we say “I have reason”
M: Ho ragione
K: That’s I have, spelt h-o, but the h is silent.
K: And to say “you’re right”, we say “you have reason”
M: Hai ragione
K: How would we say it for other people? If you know the forms of have (avere), it’s simple. If you don’t, no problem, we’ll do a quick review. How do we say “he or she has” in Italian?
M: Ha
K: Spelt h - a, but the h is silent. So how would you say “he’s right” or “she’s right” literally he or she has reason?
M: Ha ragione
K: And how do we say “we have”?
M: Abbiamo
K: Spelt a-b-b-i-a-m-o. We’re right, or we have reason?
M: Abbiamo ragione
K: In Italian, we have a “you plural” form, which we use when we’re speaking to two or more people, a bit like saying “you both” or “you all” or even “y’all” or youse, if you have that form in your dialect. You have in the plural would be:
M: Avete
K: Spelt a - v- e- t- e. You all/both are right?
M: Avete ragione
K: Finally, they have?
M: Hanno
K: Spelt h-a-n-n-o but the h is silent. They’re right?
M: Hanno ragione
K: Now we have a little favour to ask - if you’re enjoying these podcasts, please head over to itunes and write us nice review as this helps us reach more students. To do this, you can click on the link in the show notes, listen on apple podcasts, then when it opens up itunes, click on “write a review” and you should be good to go.
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If you’re like me and you find it useful to see all this stuff written down, on our website you’ll find the transcripts and other bonus materials like a quiz and flashcards to help you remember the phrases from today’s lesson. Go to www.joyoflanguages.com/italianpodcast and scroll down to episode 75.
See you next time, or as we say in Italian
Alla prossima!
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