In a summer when Italy’s latest debt-driven austerity budget threatens to slash pensions, close schools and shut down local services, one woman is warning that Italians stand to lose something less tangible but in some ways far more important – their language.

Nicoletta Maraschio is fighting to stop the closure of the Accademia della Crusca, the Florence-based institute she runs which has been considered the foremost custodian of the Italian language since it published Italy’s first dictionary in 1612.

Almost 400 years on, the government has announced plans to eliminate the academy’s €190,000 (£165,000) annual funding as part of its cull of dozens of state-funded research organisations which employ fewer than 70 people.

Read more: the Guardian

See: the Guardian