Italy bans gender-neutral symbols in schools in latest culture clash

MILAN (Reuters) - Italy's education ministry on Friday instructed schools to ban the growing use of gender-neutral symbols, saying they were unclear and flouted the rules of Italian grammar.

The move risks exacerbating tensions between the right-wing government, which portrays itself as a guardian of traditional values, and LGBTQ and womens' rights advocates.

"The use of non-compliant graphic signs, such as the asterisk (*) and the schwa (ə), is contrary to linguistic norms and risks compromising the clarity and uniformity of institutional communication", the ministry said in a statement.

On taking office in 2022, Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni sparked controversy when she said she wanted her official title of prime minister "presidente del consiglio", to be preceded by the masculine article "il", rather than the feminine "la".

In Italian, as in other Latin-based languages, nouns and adjectives take a feminine or masculine form, while in cases of plural nouns involving both genders, the masculine form takes precedence.

Some see this as an expression of male dominance and support the introduction of gender-neutral noun endings, such as asterisks or the so-called "schwa", a sort of inverted 'e'.

The Accademia della Crusca, an institution that acts as the guardian of the Italian language, has in the past suggested avoiding the novelty of gender-neutral symbols in official documents.

(Reporting by Claudia Cristoferi, editing by Gavin Jones and Editing by William Maclean)