Back to that New York Times article on resurgence of Latin in schools.
Don't get me wrong.
I'm thrilled that they're actually giving Latin its due long over due (sort of).
It's just that there needs to be some readjustment in the paint-job.
And Latin has to be careful about being damned with faint praise.
The article said, among other things,
"Latin has quietly flourished in many high-performing suburbs, like New Rochelle..." [my emphases]
Of course it has. Any school that's "high-performing" would and will do well with any subject at all, regardless of its "dead" nature (I might add here that history is likewise "dead" but people never seem to question the relevance of it - and well they should not; also that students of biology often dissect "dead" things, and again, nobody questions why - and, again, they should not).
The point to make about Latin is that if it is taught right, it's not simply the "high-performing suburbs" that will benefit - it's all schools, particularly and especially and explicitly the ones performing less well. Or rather, that the ones performing less well will, by virtue of their having a real robust Latin program, become "high-performing". Give students the opportunity to work with Latin, syntax, grammar, etc., and the problems they have in English will disappear. Why? Because to really understand Latin, you must understand the grammatical and syntactical underpinnings. Which means you have to do the same in English.
Which means you are forced to grapple with, and make sense of, the nuts and bolts of language.
This is what is so critical about studying Latin.
This is what Latin, unlike any other language, native, foreign, living, dead
has to offer.
Now the trick is to choose the right program.
Because All Latin Program Are NOT Created Equal.
drg