While Julia Revere's friends spent Saturday mornings playing netball and socialising while growing up, her parents enrolled her in three-hour Italian lessons.
"I would say that I did push back a little bit and I didn't really want to go to Italian school for quite a few years," she said.
However, the 21-year-old Melbourne university student now believes the years of persistence learning her grandparents' native language were worth it.
"It makes me feel more connected to my heritage and to my culture, in a way that makes me feel like I belong somewhere," she said.
"Just being able to talk to my nonni [grandparents] in particular … it's super important for me and it just in a way makes me feel like I'm doing enough to sort of respect them and say, 'I understand everything you went through.'"
But Ms Revere is part of a shrinking minority of young Australian Italians who can speak Italian.
She said some could speak a couple of words, but she was the only one in her family who continued studying the language in university after high school.
Post-World War II migration saw an influx of Italian migrants who introduced a new culture and language to Australia.
But as those original migrants die, the number of Australians who speak Italian has also been declining.
In 2006, Italian was Australia's most spoken language after English, according to Australian Bureau of Statistics Census data compiled by population consultancy .id.
A decade later, Italian dropped to fifth place after Mandarin, Arabic, Cantonese and Vietnamese.
Universities cut courses amid falling enrolments
Opportunities for people to learn Italian in Australia are declining as well, which institutions maintain is simply due to a lack of interest.
Flinders University in South Australia announced in October 2021 that it was planning to cut its Italian language programs, and only reversed the decision after community outcry and representations from the Italian consulate.
The university said it would retain the program for 2022.
In a statement to the ABC, Flinders University's executive dean of the College of Humanities Arts and Social Sciences, Peter Monteath, said the Italian program had seen falling enrolments over "several years".
"The most critical element is uptake, as the course can only be effective if individuals study it," Professor Monteath said.
"It is incumbent on universities operating in a constrained financial environment to find the most effective ways to maintain a range of offerings, where appropriate through cross-university collaboration."
The University of Wollongong in NSW took similar action and axed its Italian major in 2020 because of "declining student demand", but still offers a minor.
Swinburne University in Victoria cut all language courses in 2020, including Italian, because it said language study wasn't "strategically aligned" with the university's future direction.
Angela Scarino, an applied linguistics expert from the University of South Australia, said while she understood university financial constraints, Flinders University's initial decision sent a "shocking" and "highly disrespectful" message.
She said this was especially the case because universities were so well respected in society.
"It is absolutely unimaginable for me that we could be so mono-lingually driven … and to be so disrespectful to a community."
Italian still popular among high schoolers
Nevertheless, Italian is still among the most popular languages to learn in Australian high schools.
In South Australia, Italian (continuers) enrolments for year 12 students dropped below 100 for the first time in 2021, according to enrolment records since 2012, but it was still the third most popular language after Japanese and French.
Italian (continuers) enrolments for HSC students in NSW have declined, but enrolments for students with no prior knowledge of Italian have increased and account for the most Italian language learners.
It was the fourth most popular HSC language studied in 2021, according to the NSW Education Standards Authority.
Italian was the seventh most popular language among VCE students in Victoria where it has seen a decline in enrolments since 2016, according to the state's latest data from 2020.
'Belonging to two worlds'
Professor Scarino told the ABC many children of post-World War II migrants mostly spoke Italian at home, but that had not flowed to the next generation.
But that didn't necessarily mean many young Australians with Italian links weren't curious about connecting with their cultural heritage, she added.
"In the subsequent generations of Italian families, the children, young people, actually are super interested in Italian language and culture," she said.
"They have no difficulty in belonging … to two worlds, in belonging to the Italian world and to belong to their Australian world."
Professor Scarino said her research also showed a change in attitude towards learning the language.
She said while some children of Italian migrants in the 1950s experienced discrimination for speaking Italian at school and in public, that prejudice had now diminished considerably.
Italian culture had become part of Australian life, meaning young people felt more comfortable learning the language, she said.
Professor Scarino added that interest had also been driven by more young Italian-Australians wanting to travel to Italy to learn more about their cultural heritage.
"Italian now is a language of prestige, [a very common language] … and I think young people have latched onto this."
She said while languages were widely taught in schools, not enough learning time was allocated to it compared to other subjects.
Christian Verdicchio, the South Australian president of Com.It.Es, a cultural organisation affiliated with the Italian government, said universities also needed to do more to encourage language learning.
He said this was especially important because young Australians with Italian heritage were unlikely to join traditional Italian clubs, which have been mainly been a way for older members of the community to gather and speak their mother tongue.
"Learning real, contemporary Italian language and culture in our schools, in our tertiary sector will allow us to continue that relationship between Italy and Australia," he said.
Parents and families 'crucial' to learning
Professor Scarino said exposing children to a language other than English while young was the best way for children to learn.
She said it could even enhance a child's ability to learn English.
"Parents are crucial," she said.
"Families are crucial. Because the children will naturally absorb the values from the home.
"What we need to do is tell parents that you can actually have both [English and Italian] and one does not diminish the other … in fact if anything, it actually enhances it."
Anita Weeks, whose parents migrated to Australia from Italy as children, is one of many parents who are making sure their children are connecting with their ancestry and culture at a young age.
She drives her son Lincoln to one of Melbourne's few Italian playschools on the other side of the city every second week, and speaks only Italian to him on those days.
"He'd be hanging out with other kids who are also learning Italian," she said.
Ms Weeks's parents spoke to her mostly in Italian at home.
She said it was how she learned the language, so she was trying a similar approach with Lincoln.
"We have conversations about … [how his grandparents] came over on a boat … and we talk about different cultural things like, 'Oh, we're eating pizza and spaghetti and that comes from Italy.'
