USI Settimana della Svizzera italiana lands in Jura

The initiative, now in its 7th edition, will be held from January 15 to the 19, 2018 in Canton Jura, a particularly sensitive Canton when it comes to identity and Swiss minority languages.

Although the event’s main location will be the Lycée cantonal de Porrentruy, Lycée Saint-Charles and all of the Canton’s secondary schools will also take part in the activities. The initiative, supported financially by the Federal Office of Culture and Canton Jura, will kick off on January 15 in the presence of State Councillors Martial Courtet and Manuele Bertoli, and USI Rector Boas Erez. The opening ceremony will be accompanied by musical interludes by the University Choir of the Conservatorio della Svizzera italiana, which will also hold an evening concert open to the public. Young students from Jura and Ticino will act as the moderators of the ceremony. The mini student-parliament will be held on January 17. It will provide recommendations to promote the language and culture of the Swiss Italian-speaking region across the Alps, with the participation of the Federal Delegate for Plurilingualism Nicoletta Mariolini and National Councillor Pierre-Alain Fridez. In addition to concerts and performances by artists from Southern Switzerland, the vice-president of the International Castellinaria Young Film, Stelio Righenzi, will present a film selected by the Festival and hold an open debate with several classes.

Students-ambassadors, from Bellinzona to Jura

Thanks to a classes exchange carried out in collaboration with DECS and supported by Movetia, the class 3L of the Cantonal School of Commerce, Bellinzona, will act as ambassador of the Swiss Italian-speaking region. The students have been working for some time to prepare for this role, most of all thanks to the production of in-depth studies in French on the Swiss Italian-speaking region - carried out by meeting representatives of the Ticino territory - which will be displayed during the initiative.

The role of students from Jura

In order to strengthen this journey to the discovery of the Italian-speaking region, a trip to Ticino was organised in September for the theatre and Italian classes of Porrentruy high school. While travelling between Bellinzona, Locarno, Lugano and Mendrisio, students visited the USI Academy of Architecture, the Accademia Teatro Dimitri, the Teatro Sociale in Bellinzona, the LAC and participated in a two-day atelier with the Compagnia Paravento. The students from Jura have also created new content for the interactive section “+identità”, which will be set up in the high school entrance hall. The section deals in particular with gaffes and misunderstandings in the translations from German and French to Italian, with Italian words typical only to the Swiss Italian-speaking region, and examples of the uses of words deriving from Italian in the cities across the Alps. The cafeteria will also take part in the event by serving every day a typical menu, and the media library, will present a rich showcase of authors from Southern Switzerland.

A 2018 under the sign of +italiano

The calendar 365 giorni con la Svizzera italiana (365 days with the Swiss Italian-speaking region) will be handed out to about 350 students who are learning Italian in every high school and secondary school of Canton Jura. It is also available free of charge at www.piuitaliano.usi.ch. The content, organised by category and by month, can be used as teaching material by teachers, thus bringing a bit of Southern Switzerland to classes from across the Alps, where it is too often still absent.

More information

• The detailed programme of the "Settimana" is available as an attachment at https://www.usi.ch/it/7a-settimana-della-svizzera-italiana-nel-canton-giura
• Some pictures of the Jurassian and Ticino students involved in the exchange between classes and of the calendar are available as attachments at https://www.usi.ch/it/comunicati-stampa/6749