History

Ecclesiastical Latin Versus Classical Latin

Almost all resources for teaching and learning Latin focus on ‘Classical Latin’, a term typically referring to texts written between the first century BC and the first century AD, though the delineation of these boundaries is somewhat arbitrary, having far more to do with which authors are most venerated than with any kind of linguistic …

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The Specter of Humanism

Do definitions of “classical education” sound like the garbled message proudly announced by the player at the end of the line in a game of telephone? Well, that’s pretty much what is going on. Contemporary American notions of “classical education” have acquired so many distortions along the chain of transmission that if we hope to …

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How to Escape the Hyperclassical Trap

From its outset, the modern classical education movement has been primarily conceived as a reaction against the powerful progressive forces that shape our current educational landscape. Many of the foundational philosophical books in classical education begin with a chapter titled something like “Our Education Crisis” or “The Loss of Learning” or “The Failure of Modern …

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What Are the Romance Languages? (And Are They Actually “Romantic”?)

The Romance languages: We love to learn them. Even as other languages rise in global significance, French, Spanish, and Italian remain among the most popular foreign tongues for English speakers to acquire.   For many of us, the Romance languages conjure up the best of Europe. We think of Venetian canals and the Eiffel Tower, idyllic …

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