At the end of January, Ivy League school Princeton announced that it is going to be teaching the Latin language as an immersion course. The class will be entirely spoken in Latin.
This is incredibly exciting news for history buffs, classics majors, and language nerds, because it means a classical language is sticking around for many more years to come. However, there's a slight problem with Princeton heralding itself as some sort of revolutionary hero
They aren't the first school to do it. In fact, they aren't the only college in the United States doing it, for that matter. Because our own, humble, Western Washington University, in Bellingham, Washington has been doing it for years. How do I know this?
I was one of the students who went through the program. I will be graduating from Western Washington University with a Latin minor, after taking two years, six quarters worth, of Latin. All taught in Latin.
This is considered remarkable because often Latin classes don't teach the language in order for students to have an effective grasp of the language. It's mostly taught for translation, so its memorization, not actual fluency of a language. These students can translate poetry, but they can't hold their own in a conversation entirely in Latin.
While I am more than excited to see Living Latin classes becoming more popular, as many will now be reaping the benefits of learning the beautiful language... Princeton is touting themselves to be a pioneer in this, while meanwhile WWU has been doing this for at least 10 years, without any sort of press coverage.
I've written this article to celebrate Western's revolutionary language program because while Princeton is an Ivy League school and can hog the spotlight Western's Modern and Classical Language program, and the professors in it taught me Latin for two years, gave me fluency in the language and so much more. Western may not be Ivy League, but it taught me Latin while people asked: "Why would you take Latin?"
All that being said, I am excited to see Princeton's Living Latin course begin.
Bona fortuna, Princeton.
