Italian Handbooks for Russian Language Teaching at University over the Past Thirty Years. Achieved Goals and Perspectives

Excluding D. De Vivo’s 1882 Russian grammar, commissioned by the publisher Schnakenburg in Dorpat, the first grammar of the Russian language published in Italy dates back to 1897 (Voinovich) and was published in Milan by Hoepli. In the 20th century, the elaboration of volumes aimed at teaching Russian progressively evolved in Italy, in accordance with the new direction that glottodidactics was developing, moving away from the grammatical-translative method and embracing communicative approaches. It is, however, in the last three decades that we have witnessed a surprising flowering in quantity and quality. The article begins with an overview of the types of aids and manuals for Russian language teaching published in Italy in the last thirty years, highlighting the objectives achieved and the possible aspects to be strengthened, and then provides some reflections on the perspectives of further development that are already evident.