• Question: Was it a struggle speaking Italian as your first language to break into the United Kingdom scientific community?

    Asked by Lauren to Stef on 11 Mar 2015.
    • Photo: Mariastefania De Vido

      Mariastefania De Vido answered on 11 Mar 2015:

      Hello!

      Luckily I studied English language when I was a student in Italy and during my high school years I used to spend part of my summer holidays in the United Kingdom to further improve my English.

      Many scientific books and papers I had to study at University did not have any translation into Italian, so I had to read them in English. This allowed me to learn technical terminology directly in English. Therefore, before starting to work in the United Kingdom, I already knew the language quite well.

      Of course I faced some difficulties, especially during the first months, but I have been improving since then and now I don’t find big problems in dealing with the other scientists or local people (even though I still make some mistakes…). 😉

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