Italian Double Consonants A problem that English people encounter in learning Italian has to do with double consonants, which in Italian are phonemic i.e. if a single consonant in a word is replaced with that consonant doubled the meaning of the word can change too. This does not happen in English and so English people are not used to noticing a diffence in pronunciation. If we take the Italian word "tuta", which means overalls or boiler suit, or something similar, It might be difficult for the learner of Italian to distinguish it from "tutta" which is a feminine form of an adjective meaning "all". Not only does the failure to make this distinction cause a confusion as to meaning but it will cause a few smiles, even if the meaning is not in question. If you break these words into syllables the matter will become clearer. Wnen we say the English word "magnet' we put it into two syllables with a consonant at the end of each: mag - net. In fact, we couldn't say magn -et or ma - gnet, without distorting the sound. With the Italian words mentioned we have to say tu - ta for tuta and tut - ta for tutta. If you said tutt - a or tu - tta you would only hear one t sound even it was heavy. I hope this helps to clarify this distinction.