5 ways latin has helped me

Cooper Buss

1
I got to use my information on the Roman military project for my military history class. For the battle of Canaan, I was tasked at making a presentation requiring the Latin troop structure. Doing a Latin project beforehand made my job very easy. This is because I could apply my knowledge of Roman foot soldiers weapons and maniple formation


2
my second experience when Latin helped me was in Julius ceasar. This  was because Mr. Adcox changed the sections where are names went into Latin. This meant that where you here supposed to put name, Nomine was there instead. I know what nomine means because on every Latin assignment, It is where I put my name. The word Nomine  also means name in Latin.

3
Latin also helped me in Julius  Caesar for historical reasons. for a quiz, we where required to know the date Caesar died, witch I knew from Latin 2.I used my knowledge learned form Latin to help me answer that question on the English quiz, witch helped bump that quiz grade from a B to a B+. I also am aware that I got that question wrong on a recent Latin quiz, but I also got some things wrong that I knew also on that quiz. The date of Caesars is march 15 44 bce.

4
I used Latin during my trip to a convention called PAX(Penny Arcade Expo) south in San Antonio. the motto for Pax means Accipitis Donum. This word roughly means accept the house, and it took me a while to figure out what it meant. This is because I knew what Accipitus Donum meant, but because so, was even more confused about why the penny arcade exchanges motto was that. Because of  my Latin knowledge, I was able to have a conversation with my family at a arcade convention.

5
Latin has helped me with other translations aswell. During a lazy Saturday night, my family decided to watch the movie John Wick 3: Parabellum. 5 seconds in to the movie, I was asked by my family what parabellum means. I knew what para and bellum both meant because of my Greek and Latin derivative tests in TJCL; near or beside war. In the movie context, this title does not make sense because John Wick kills many entire fleets of people, making the movie more like John Wick 3: Belllum. Because of my knowledge of Latin and Greek derivatives, I was able to translate a movie title.

Latin helps me, while not every single day, quite often in my life.Learning Latin has gave me a sense of how many languages form, and my knowledge of Latin has allowed me to pick up phrases of other languages as well. Latin also has helped me understand many of the words in my nerd community. Because I learned Latin, I can communicate easier with the world.

How Latin has helped me

1) The first time Latin helped me in the world was to recognize the title of a game and understand why it was called what it is. It is a visual novel called carpe diem and although i have never played it I believe it is about a friend leaving you behind and you have to do as much in the day as you can.

2) The second time Latin has helped me was with the word defenestration. Since fenestra is window in Latin I decided the meaning would be something like out of window. The actual meaning of the word is to throw something out of a window.

3) The third time Latin helped was in chemistry. I recognized that Au and Ag on the periodic table were gold and silver. Their Latin words are Aurum and Argentum which is how they got their abbreviations on the periodic table.

4) Another usage of the word Aurum I found in a game called Kid Icarus. I didn't recognize at the time that the name of the enemy would translate to the the gold army. I find this choice strange as the enemies themselves are more silver with green accents. The title of the game is also a reference to the myth of Icarus. The main character is an angel that cant flt by himself and needs the help of his goddess Palutena to fly. Even after he has been given the power of flight he cannot use it for more than 5 minutes at a time or his wings will burn up like Icarus when he flew too close to the sun.

5) My last example is about a game called Ryse: Son of Rome. the game itself is all about the Roman legions fighting Celtic barbarians and when I first saw it I didn't pay much attention to the details but I would like to say most of them are relatively accurate. They have accurate looking armor minus keeping the plumes on their helmets attached in battle and they use a short sword to fight, although with more slashing than stabbing. They also use certain formations such as the testudo formation when advancing on enemies and you can see in game arrows entering their shields which would prove its effectiveness. 

What Latin Has Done for me

1. Some time last year, I was watching a movie (I don't remember the name but I do remember when I watched it because my memory is weird), and one of the characters said, "ergo". Being familiar with the popular Latin phrase "Cogito, ergo sum.", I recognized "ergo" as the Latin word for "therefore".

2. While looking at the periodic table in my bedroom (yes, I have a periodic table poster hanging over my bed), I noticed that the atomic symbol for gold was "Au". The word "gold" had neither of these letters in it, but I remembered the Latin word for gold, "aurum" I then concluded that the atomic symbol for gold was derived from its Latin word.

3. Just earlier today, I was again perusing my periodic table when I looked at scandium, and realized that it looked similar to "Scandia", the Roman name for Scandinavia (which is a key part of my world domination plot).

4. Earlier this month, I was reading through the second book in the Fablehaven series when I came across the word "cogitator". Again recalling the aforementioned phrase "Cogito, ergo sum.", I guessed that "cogitator" meant "thinker", and according to the dictionary, I was correct.

5. Last year, we were reading "The Odyssey" in English class. This epic is almost entirely based upon Greek mythology, and I recognized many of the key events due to prior knowledge of Roman mythology (more specifically, I recognized the names of gods like Zeus and matched their names to those of their Roman counterparts (Jupiter in this case)).

One of the reasons that Latin is so impactful is that it has derivatives in so many languages. These languages were, and are, spoken by the powerful countries that helped shape the modern world. Because of this, Latin has served as the foundation for much of the civilization we have today.

-Connor Ramsey

How Latin has helped me

How Latin has helped me

1. In English this week, we were reading Things Fall Apart, which is set in a country in Africa. Certain words from the local language are included in the book. We discussed in class the use of feminine and masculine words, which is not as prominent in English. By studying Latin prior to reading this book, I understood the masculine/feminine aspect of words better, and I recognized it when we discussed them in class.

2. Watching Grey's Anatomy a few months ago, I recognized the phrase "pro bono". They used this phrase when they talked about doing surgeries for free. The phrase comes from Latin and means for good or for the better. 

3. In World History this week, we were looking at different articles of a declaration from the French and American revolutions. The articles were numbered with Roman numerals, which I recognized from Latin. It helped me understand the assignment better.

4. This week, the first Parish Olympics was held. The games that the Latin section hosted mirrored some events from the ancient Olympics. The fights with the pool noodles resembled the ancient gladiator fights and other events represented ancient events as well.

5. In math, we are talking about polynomial functions and there are degrees stemmed from Latin. Some names are quartic and quintic, and I recognized them from the words from Latin numbers.

Latin is an important building block of our language. You see it everywhere. I would encourage students to take it in the future to enhance their learning and appreciate more of the world around them and how it came to be. I appreciate Latin's role in my education in all of my classes. 

Maddy Collins

Latin Everyday

1. My first example was in chemistry class. Mr. Abronowitz wrote i.e. on the word when he was talking about more examples of a certain concept. I.E stands for id est which translates to this is. The prefix in English shows a lot of the time that there are more examples coming after the one that you just listed. You see this a lot in writing.

2. While filling out an application, I saw that one of the people who worked for the program had a Ph.D. in front of their name. That official name stands for Philosophiae doctor. This is a name that is given to someone who has completed a certain amount of school or has gone to learn more about a specific topic.

3. In English, Mr. Adcox wrote E.G on the board as he was listing some examples of a writing technique. Those letters stand for exempli gratia. That directly translates from Latin to for example. That's why people write it before listing off examples.

4. The other day, my mom was talking about going to Europe for vacation this summer. We talked about going all around the area, so places like Greece and Rome came into the conversation. I was able to tell her more about the places that would be interesting to visit because of some of our in-class conversations about them.

5. My younger brother is in Latin in seventh grade. He asked me to help him with his homework, which was over vocab, nouns, and verbs. I was able to help him with the verb endings because of what I've learned. I was able to help him learn that different verb endings meant different persons, like you, he, she and it. I was also able to give him tips about learning his vocab because I've learned how to study for vocab quizzes over the years I've taken Latin.

How Latin has helped me

How Latin has helped me

Finn Collins

The Battle of Cannae and military history

After I researched the Battle of Cannae for Latin class we learned about it in Military History. My preknowledge on this battle and the Battle of Zama helped me a lot in understanding our military history comprehension questions. My knowledge of Roman military customs and leadership also helped me when taking notes on battles I did not know about. The history part of our Latin curriculum helped me a lot in my Military History Class and helped me understand the Latin Military.

Quid Pro Quo

The obvious one that comes to mind is the phrase Quid Pro Quo. This 3 word Latin phrase is at the center of all news programs right now. Meaning "this for that" is a phrase used to talk about a deal or a trade. My knowledge of Latin Vocabulary and mottoes gave me the edge when I first heard the term on KERA. While other people might have to look up what Quid Pro Quo means, I remembered what that motto meant because we learned it in our unit on mottoes.

Track and The Olympics

I recently joined the track team and with the Olympics coming up I felt that I should write about how Latin has helped me know more about these two events. In Latin, we learned about the origins of the Olympics and some of the track and field events. This knowledge won't help me in getting to the Olympics or shave a minute of my mile time but it is useful knowledge and helps me know about the history of popular sports. Because of Latin, I knew what events I could see in track and field and the different origins of Olympic sports.

Law and Order

Latin has helped me understand my favorite show Law and Order. It helped me understand the legal terms. Before the Latin blog post about Latin legal terms, most of the things said in Latin in the law and order courtroom went over my head. But because we were taught about these different terms (ie Ex parte, Postmortem.) Latin helped me further understand my favorite television show and its complex legal terms. Of course, this also helps me understand legal terms in real life but it was more helpful to understand my favorite tv show.

Trip to Italy

Latin helped me enjoy my trip to Italy more. Learning about ancient Rome gave me a preknowledge of the architecture and history of Rome. My experience visiting the Roman Forum was made better because I knew how they used this space and who would walk in this area. It also helped me learn more about the Colosseum. It really let me understand where I was and the importance of it all.

Latin has helped me enjoy and understand obscure and big pieces of knowledge. Whether pertaining to legal terms or historic events Latin has shaped the way I look at ancient history. Latin affects aspects of our everyday lives and I feel sympathy for those who did not pursue Latin. Latin is the best choice I could've made in a language

How Latin has helped me

The first place latin has helped me outside of class was during English 1 last year. It helped me because I was only able to understand english grammar by learning it in latin. One example I remember very well was infinitives in english because I found it really difficult to know how the infinitive was functioning. Luckily, the words in latin that help you identify its function were the same in english. The next place latin was helpful was during Donald Trump’s impeachment. Everybody started talking about a quid pro quo without ever providing a translation. However, I did know the translation, which is what for what or this for this. The next place I noticed latin was this wednesday. I was in a car and I noticed a Marriott hotel, and realized that their logo is a latin cursive M. The next place I noticed latin was earlier this school year. I don’t know how I never made the connection until then, but September-December are based off of 7-10 in latin. After realizing this I got frustrated with the calendar because septem means seven, but september is the 9th month of the year. The next example is a reference to Roman history that I noticed about 2 months ago. The reference took place in Star Wars when Palpatine convinces the senate to transition the galactic government from a Republic to an Empire. The reference is to how Julius Caesar transitions Rome from a Republic to an Empire. I have appreciated taking latin because it has made school easier by actually teaching me grammar. It is also nice to understand references to Roman History. Also, some parts of life are in latin, so it a lot easier to translate it when I know most of the grammar in latin.

-Diego Roman