Ci sono buoni amici, vecchi amici e nuovi amici, e poi ci sono i falsi amici. I falsi amici mandano in confusione la maggior parte di chi impara una lingua straniera poiché sono parole che si presentano in maniera simile in due lingue, ma che in realtà contengono significati completamente diversi. Qui di seguito la top ten dei falsi amici italiano<>inglese.

1. Sensible/sensitive
Your skin isn’t sensible (ragionevole) – it’s sensitive (sensibile). You could be a sensible person with sensitive skin.

2. Camera/room
On holiday you need your camera (macchina fotografica) for taking photos and your room (stanza) for sleeping in.

3. Library/bookstore
I bought a book from the library (biblioteca)…no you didn’t, you borrowed a book from the library, you can only buy one from a bookstore (libreria), online or otherwise.

4. Vocabulary/dictionary
You say your English is rusty and you need to improve your dictionary (vocabolario)? Noooo, you need to improve your vocabulary (glossario), you can use a dictionary full of words and their definitions to do it though.

5. Factory/farm
You visited a factory (fabbrica) over the weekend with the kids? Were there live cows and sheep feeding and milking? Yes? Well perhaps it was a farm (fattoria) not a factory?

6. Discussion/argument
Try to have discussions (discussioni) in meetings and not arguments (litigi); you’ll get better results.

7. Magazine/warehouse
Julian was reading his magazine (rivista) in the warehouse (magazzino) when the merchandise arrived.

8. Incident/accident
Incidentally, there have been lots of incidents (casi) of drunk driving accidents (incidenti) this year.

9. Print/stamp
Please print (stampa) the documents sign, stamp (affrancalo) and send them in an envelope.

10. Toast/toast
Let’s make a toast (brindisi) to all the people who helped us make this toasted sandwich (toast) delicious!

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