Welcome to Hestia's weekly live tweet! This week's discussion, led by @ala_Camillae, will look into @IndwellingLang 's @eidolon_journal article "Teaching Latin to Humans," as well as @MagisterBracey 's "Why Students of Color Don't Take Latin." #langchat #teachancient
We begin with discussion on Bracey's article. @ala_Camillae notes that both articles come from the school of thought of Comprehensible Input (CI) and Second Language Acquisition (SLA).
The idea behind these is that we don't teach Latin like other languages; we prioritize grammar over students' actual understanding of the texts. From Bracey's standpoint, this alienates a lot of students of color.
@ala_Camillae opens discussion by asking what people thought of this article. @rympasco says the idea of CI is very exciting, but also intimidating. Most Latin teachers aren't really equipped to do that, and additional training can be a significant obstacle.
@ala_Camillae this is especially intimidating when you're in a predominately white field. A cohort says this article really resonated with them, especially observations about the exclusivity via emphasis on rote memorization in Latin classes.
@mercury_witch the big problem of enrollment issues in Latin is scary for small Classics departments and those of us on the job market, but the way we teach Latin has hardly changed since it was the foundation of a "liberal arts" education hundreds of years ago.
@rympasco and @ala_Camillae point to the tired old pitches of how Latin can help with your vocab and with learning other languages and how that's not exciting for students to hear; a cohort points out that learning Latin has definitely taught them useful skills, particularly...
...rhetorical skills. @leannalovee says it's good to push it for bigger life skills like writing or speaking skills, but as @i_nurmi says, these skills really only develop when you get into upper level Latin.
@mercury_witch points out the problem w/ waiting for these upper level classes to inspire future classicists is that most schools require two semesters of a language, and that's why most students are even taking Latin; if you hate Latin 101&102 because it's rote memorization...
...@mercury_witch then what's motivating you to stick with Latin when your language requirement has been fulfilled? Another cohort points out that even then, why choose Latin as a requirement when there are other more "useful" languages to pick?
So what's the pitch? What makes Latin so special? @ala_Camillae the importance of knowing grammar, cases, sequence of verbs etc., these are skills that don't help us comprehend language--they are skills that help us understand how a language functions. They're applicable...
...to reading or writing, but for a student just learning these things and not given enough time to wear down pathways in the brain, they aren't actually reading the language-just trying to understand what's happening with the different moving pieces. (cf. esp. @IndwellingLang)
@rympasco it's important to also look at and teach the values implicit in the language and vocabulary we're teaching and to confront the whitewashing present here. The Cambridge Latin course is basically Britain qua Rome.
@ala_Camillae says Bracey's comment on the importance of students of color having instructors that "look like them" resonates heavily with the above quoted twitter threads; Bracey links an article demonstrating statistics of dropout rates when there is no such representation.
@ala_Camillae notes that @TheLunaticLi 's thread (cited above) points out that it's not only important to have professors/instructors of color, but also to have professors/instructors that make the extra effort to make students feel accepted and comfortable and safe in...
...predominately white spaces. @i_nurmi we've all had experiences where students automatically give instructors "preferred" names, assuming that an effort won't be made to learn how to pronounce their given names. This is especially problematic in a classroom where...
...we constantly ask our students to memorize some pretty bonkers names (Alcibiades e.g.). @rympasco shares experiences trying to make the extra effort to pronounce a name, asking whether it's correct, and asking what's actually preferred rather than asking for a name off the bat
@ala_Camillae is the microagression of mispronouncing a name going to do equal damage? a cohort asks: is it ok to ask how to pronounce the name? Another cohort says it's better to try to do one-on-one if you can.
@mercury_witch we've discussed in previous meetings the risk of reading off of an attendance list and using a potentially dead name for a student. @leannalovee suggests giving name cards, and potentially asking students to give phonetic spellings for pronunciation if students...
...are concerned about mispronunciation. On the cards, you can ask for nicknames as well. That way you have a pre-understanding of the pronunciation. You might still get it wrong, but it gives you an avenue to ask one-on-one if you're correct.
@Brododaktylos says you can offer as a blanket statement to the class that they are welcome to correct you either in the moment or in private if you've mispronounced something. Cohort says: to complicate things, we should be wary of imputing to them a motive they don't have for..
...picking an American name. Those choices aren't always to avoid mispronunciation. We need to be wary of cultural projection. Entire group agrees that this is a really important point.
@Brododaktylos tells students she's happy to use nicknames if they want, but asks if they would prefer she use that or their given names (this is done one-on-one). We all agree that when you can be one-on-one, that's the best possible situation.
@leannalovee you also can't assume that if someone doesn't correct you that means you're pronouncing it right; shares her own personal experience with people mispronouncing her name, but not correcting them.
@ala_Camillae turns our attention to a few of @DLibatique10 's tweets (from thread cited above).
Classics in general needs to be better about hiring instructors of color, and if we aren't directly involved in that process...
Classics in general needs to be better about hiring instructors of color, and if we aren't directly involved in that process...
...we need to speak up whenever we can and try to stress that importance to the people who are. Idea shared that some people suggest that acceptance or hirings of students/instructors of color are only to fulfill diversity quotas. That can be a real concern and poses...
...a really insidious imposter syndrome specific to students/instructors of color. As soon as someone says this to you, that sets the gears of doubt in motion.
@ala_Camillae points out that we are often talking about the issue of EQUITY vs that of equality; however, we need to be wary of not being condescending to anyone in our efforts to create a more equitable/accepting field of study that's traditionally a white discipline.
A cohort emphasizes that this discipline is traditionally white not because the texts intrinsically suggest white supremacy but because the people who have been teaching it for centuries have held those prejudices. (<- !!!)
W. E. B. Dubois discusses the liberating power of the Classics, e.g.; Derek Walcott another e.g. (many given; live-tweeter can't keep up); @Brododaktylos returns to @MagisterBracey 's point that instructors often fail to point out factors like polychromy and the ethnic identity..
...of many classical figures that would create a more inclusive environment/point out its non-white reality. Cohort: for many students who can't point to cultural background in "western" history, why should they care? But the diversity of the ancient world is a way to...
...demonstrate that there's more to Classics than the things that prejudiced groups i.e. white nationalists purport as the Classical identity/value. Another point: the literature itself is so wonderful, and translations can't do it justice--we can introduce students...
...to ancient languages by pointing out the truth that nothing in translation can really capture the original language--it will always fall short. That's an enticing prospect! And we all have experience with being drawn to read the original languages of the things we love!
@ala_Camillae says this ties in to @IndwellingLang 's article (which we will have to revisit next week as well); @Brododaktylos says that one favorite aspect of J. S. Bailey's article was that it suggests actually applicable and easy strategies to start with--the suggestion...
...that we don't actually have to overhaul everything in order to start practicing these methods ourselves and normalizing them in the classroom.
@ala_Camillae hands out an exercise from @IndwellingLang 's talk last night at UMASS Boston: "Engaging the Whole Reader: 'Active Latin' as a bridge between student and text"; it's some Cicero, but with some "extra" Latin missing...
...each new paragraph adds back in a bit of the original Latin; asks students to figure out: what's new? How do you translate it? Quickly, students prove to themselves that they can get through long amounts of Latin. #langchat
@Brododaktylos says both the article and talk did a great job discussing the way language is acquired; we need an instinctive knowledge of what works in a language, which is done better by working with small languages and *hearing* the language.
Takeaways: @mercury_witch both of these articles point to the fact that we need to both make a concerted effort to decenter Latin and Greek and the classrooms in which they're taught, as well as make them more accessible.
@mercury_witch often these languages are still erroneously held as "elite languages"; that implies an exclusionary level of difficulty--if you don't get it, you'll never get it. You need to make them accessible to all students. #teachancient
@i_nurmi done right, accessibility can work very well, particularly things like spoken Latin; but like anything else, it can create dangerous issues (such as prejudiced groups that want to reassert it as the language of education).
@Brododaktylos there are also problems with spoken Greek. Spoken ancient Greek is heavily associated with the fascist party in Greece--these are all very tricky subjects.
Thank you for following this week's live tweet, brought to you by @mercury_witch. We'll be back next week to talk about similar issues specifically about teaching languages, with a faculty guest speaker in attendance. Stay tuned! #teachancient #langchat #classicstwitter
