MASTER COMBINED PRONOUNS WITH THIS EXERCISE AND ELEVATE YOUR ITALIAN SPEAKING SKILLS.

All possible combinations of indirect and direct pronouns in Italian. Image copyright: The JP Method.

First off, if I were to ask you "what is a pronoun, and why do we need it?" would you be able to answer? Maybe you would, and that's great. But if you wouldn't, let's take a few minutes to understand a simple but essential concept.

A pronoun is a small word that we use to replace another part of the sentence. Why would we want to replace a part of a sentence? Well, that's because we mentioned it before, or someone else did during the conversation, and we don't need to keep saying it over and over. More technically, we can refer to a part of the sentence we can replace with a pronoun as 'known information'.

Being able to use pronouns adequately and with a fair degree of fluency is going to help you streamline your conversation. Therefore let me introduce a practical way for you to use them comfortably, easily, and smoothly.

Combined pronouns, as the phrase suggests, are combinations of direct and indirect object pronouns. To review what they are, check out the table below.

For context, this table includes the subject pronouns.

Simply enough, you can use a direct object pronoun to replace a direct object in a sentence, as in the following example:

E.g. Ennio ha comprato un regalo. --> Ennio LO ha comprato.

In the same way, you can replace an indirect object with an indirect object pronoun in a sentence, as in the following example:

E.g. Ennio ha comprato un regalo per suo figlio. --> Ennio GLI ha comprato un regalo.

But what happens when you want to replace both the direct and the indirect object in the sentence? Here is:

E.g. Armando GLIe LO ha comprato.

You should be familiar with all this because that's what they teach you all the time.

What they don't teach you, however, is how to apply it to a sentence quickly and comfortably. Here's what you need to do.

1) Scroll up to the green table. These are all the possible combinations of direct + indirect object pronouns. You'll notice the 'i' vowel in the indirect pronouns changes to 'e'. That's simply to make the pronounciation easier. Anyway, this is what your combined pronouns must sound like. You need to read these combinations aloud over and over. Read them vertically or horizontally in the order you find them at first, then hop randomly from one to the other, always ALOUD. You need your ears and phonatory apparatus to become perfectly acquainted with how they sound as you say them.

2) Below are a few sentences. In each one of them, replace the direct and indirect objects with combined pronouns. Before you go, here's something you want to remember: the indirect object you want to replace is 99% of the time introduced by either the preposition PER or the preposition A.

No pen and paper. They shouldn't even be in sight. This exercise is for you to practice speaking, not writing.

Once you're done, do it over again a few times. You need to create some kind of automatism.

. Amore, mi dispiace ma stasera non posso portare il frullatore a tua cugina.

. Scusi professore, può prestare il libro a mio figlio?

. Racconta questa bella storia a tua madre.

. Tesoro, farfallina, puoi preparare un caffè per me e Alfredo, per piacere?

. Perché non chiediamo in prestito un sacco a pelo a Oreste?

. Ciao Stefania, sono rimasta senza zucchero. Puoi prestarmi un po' di zucchero?

. Il dentista ha tolto un dente del giudizio a Emanuela.

. Amore, ciliegina, mi prepareresti una bella cenetta per stasera?

. Papà, ho bisogno che presti a me e mio fratello trecento euro per il concerto di stasera.

. Luigi ha chiesto se puoi prenotare l'aula studio per lui. Grazie.

3) At this point, make simple sentences like the ones above but without the frills ('ciliegina', 'farfallina', and all that stuff). 'Make' means 'SAY ALOUD'.

Here's how you do it. You first come up off the top of your head with a simple sentence with a direct object and an indirect object introduced by 'PER' or 'A', and say it aloud.

Use these verbs: 'prestare', 'portare', 'dare', 'prenotare', 'preparare', 'comprare'.

Then, you say the same sentence aloud but this time you're going to replace the direct and indirect objects with the appropriate combined pronouns.

Say ten sentences. If you can't quickly come up with a sentence, repeat one you said before.

Practice like this twice a day for a few days.

If you have the patience and consistency to do this, you will be able to use combined pronouns in a sentence whenever you want and with much more confidence. These exercises combined with your motivation and focus will truly elevate your Italian speaking skills.

One last note: you have probably noticed that the third person feminine indirect pronouns disappear when combined with direct pronouns. Before it even crosses your mind that this is a product of Italy's "disgustingly patriarchal culture", let me stop you right there.

This phenomenon--like many others--is merely morphological. It happens to avoid combinations like 'le le', or 'le lo', which wouldn't sound as euphonic as 'gliele' or 'glielo'. In other words, it facilitates pronunciation and makes it sound prettier.

And this is The JP Method for Italian!