2022-02-06.md 2.0 KB
+++ title = "Doing Latin without thinking about it" author = ["George M Jones"] publishDate = 2022-02-06T00:00:00-05:00 lastmod = 2023-12-06T05:46:23-05:00 tags = ["latin", "100DaysToOffload", "duolingo"] categories = ["blog"] draft = false +++
This may be obvious to people who are fluent in several languages, but communicating in different languages does not have to be like working a proof in geometry. The Latin I learned focused on being able to consciously understand all 144 different inflected forms (yes, 144) of any standard Latin verb. Pretty sure most children in antiquity could not separate a genitive geurnd from a supine from a plural perfect passive participle. But they could talk.
{{< figure src="/ox-hugo/ForumRomanarumNocte.jpg" caption="Figure 1: \\"Forum Romanarum Nocte, Anno MMXIX\\" by George Jones is licenced under CC SA 4.0" width="600px" >}}
I've been doing both the Spanish and Latin courses on duolingo for a few weeks (24 days, per the app). Today, I had an experience I've not had in 35 years of toying with Latin: I was translating without being aware of conjugations or declensions or even if I was translating to or from Latin. They flip quickly between reading, listening and written translation exercises in the native language and the language being learned. It was so effective that I forgot which language I was working in. It was just ideas and words.
To repeat a quote from an earlier blog post:
There is no reason why learners should be made to treat every Latin text as puzzle to be deciphered into translation, rather than a specimen of normal human communication to be understood as such.
http://blogicarian.blogspot.com/2019/03/argumentum-ad-ignorantiam.html?m=1
Euge, Duolingo!
#4 of #100DaysToOffload take 2, https://100daystooffload.com/.