Taxacom: Latin

[Richard Jensen]

George wrote: "...Sorry, but it isn't widely taught any more. Very few
people in the world as
a whole are taught Latin! I wasn't, and in fact no one I know was...."

What defines widely, especially on a global basis?  I bet Mandarin is not
widely taught on a global basis, yet how many people use it daily?  My
question about isolation was answered by at least two on this list, and I
would bet, if you started asking around, you would find that you know more
than that who took Latin. Your comment that "90% don't" avoids recognizing
that there are a lot of schools teaching Latin, unless you believe that 10%
is a meaningless proportion. In fact, there has been a resurgence in recent
years as evidenced by the fact that over 130,000 high school students in
the US took the Latin Advanced Placement test and the number is increasing
yearly.

Cheers,

Richard J





On Mon, Jun 26, 2023 at 4:41 PM George Beccaloni <g.beccaloni at gmail.com>
wrote:

> Just proves my point - so 90% do not offer Latin, and no doubt only a
> fraction of those pupils at the 10% of schools which do offer it, actually
> take it. Since taxonomy is a global endeavor, the question is (as I said in
> my original message), what proportion of students in the entire world take
> Latin. I am sure it is much less than 1%. I went to schools on 3
> continents (including the USA) and none offered Latin. I would have been
> interested as I started collecting and studying butterflies from the age of
> 10 and wanted to know more about scientific names.
>
> Best wishes,
>
> George
>
> ****************************************************************************
> *Dr George Beccaloni FLS*
> *Director, Alfred Russel Wallace Correspondence Project*
>
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> ****************************************************************************
>
>
> On Mon, 26 Jun 2023 at 21:33, Richard Jensen <rjensen at saintmarys.edu>
> wrote:
>
>> Do you live in isolation?  About 10% of US high schools offer Latin. so
>> hundreds (thousands?) of students take it every year..  I had Latin and
>> Spanish in high school and the former certainly helped with the latter!
>>
>> Cheers,
>>
>> Richard J
>>
>> --
>> Richard Jensen, Professor Emeritus
>> Department of Biology
>> Saint Mary's College
>> Notre Dame, IN 46556
>>
>

-- 
Richard Jensen, Professor Emeritus
Department of Biology
Saint Mary's College
Notre Dame, IN 46556