The Emperor's New Clothes: Hyperreality and the Study of Latin

Abstract

The movement to teach Latin by the four skills approach, exemplified by the New York State syllabus Latin for communication, falls within the context of bizarre attempts to convince the public that a dead language is a living language. The psychological factors fueling that movement arise from a perceived need by endangered Latin teachers to survive in a modern language world and from a romantic desire to re‐create the past—where reality is replaced by hyperreality. This obsession with the “real thing” has led to the creation of hyperreal Latin—a prominent feature of the New York State syllabus, which essentially claims to teach students to speak, hear, write, and read Latin like the ancient Romans. The purpose of this article is to refute that spurious and unattainable claim, while calling for a return to an honest and reasonable way of teaching the classical language, along lines that help preserve its uniqueness and traditional integrity.