Italian Conjunctive Mood: Instructions for Use

Last Friday at 6 PM, I hosted a webinar on the conjunctive mood entitled, “Italian Conjunctive Mood: Instructions for Use”. The webinar was attended by a large number of students, some of whom I have known for a long time, and others whom I was delighted to meet for the first time.

The webinar was a great success. Together we explored the various cases in which the conjunctive mood is used in Italian, as well as those cases in which either the conjunctive or the indicative mood can be used, with the appropriate stylistic differences. We also hypothesized about the possible reasons why Italians are using the conjunctive mood less and less frequently.

The webinar was interactive. Students had the opportunity to meet in small groups, discuss the material, and play games.

In one game, students had to complete sentences expressing personal opinions with the conjunctive mood: e.g., io penso che studiare online sia meglio che studiare in presenza (I think that studying online is better than studying in person).

In another game, they had to describe the type of teacher they were looking for, using the limiting conjunctive mood: e.g., cerco un insegnante che sappia spiegarmi bene il congiuntivo (I am looking for a teacher who can explain to me how to use the conjunctive mood well).

This was followed by a game in which they practiced the conjunctive mood in an independent clause, expressing wishes for each other e.g., Che tu possa essere felice (I wish you all the best).

Finally, they transformed sentences in the indicative mood into the conjunctive mood using connectives such as “sebbene” (“even though”) and “di modo che” (“so that”).

I would like to express my sincere gratitude to all of the students who participated. I invite them to attend my upcoming webinars, which will be held free of charge once a month.