AureliaeLacrimae

Yes, well, that's the charm of the ancient languages. They are no longer spoken and therefore are studied by only some people. I don't know why I chose it. I guess it was because I couldn't study Old English. I am happy, though. Latin gives me pleasure. And it certainly helps with a lot of other languages. All of them have some of their vocabulary based on the Latin roots, so if nothing, you have the advantage over other students.

Of course that literature is relevant! You can’t say that you know a language unless you’ve read the works written in that language. And I am sorry to say, but reading outside of the class doesn’t really count. How much of Dickens’ perspective of the world and the reasons behind his writing can you figure out on your own? Not much, I’d say. We all enjoy reading a good book from time to time, but what you get from leisure reading is very small when compared to class discussions and teacher’s guidance. There’s always something that you learn. Always! No matter how good you are at English, how smart or how diligent. There are simply some answers that can’t be found on Wikipedia, SparkNotes and such websites. Even reading critical works can be exhausting and still leave you with questions, and that if you think about asking them. What about Virginia Woolf? James Joyce? I’d like to see someone reading Joyce without the help of a teacher. It’s practically impossible. What of Renaissance? Who had written in English during the period of Renaissance? Or Neo-Classisicm? Romanticism? The Age of Sensationalism? Avant-garde? Modernism? Or even a better question is how many people can actually count (and tell you about) at least four works written in English prior to Renaissance - without help of Google and all those little toys that are used nowadays, simply by using their high-school knowledge. What’s the meaning of those early works? In what form of language were they written? Or Chaucer? We all know about The Canterbury Tales, correct? What about Troilus and Criseyde? Shakespeare had a play with the same name (only it’s Troilus and Cressida), by the way - and the story is from the antiquity, which brings me to another question - the importance of the familiarity with the antiquity and the Bible, which can be crucial for understanding many scenes in many books. I’ll even take names of the poets - fifteen poem titles of any period in the history prior to modernism they don’t even have to be that important to the mainstream trend of the particular age. All of this is a part of the syllabus of the English literature. And then there’s history. I won’t even start talking about that, for if I do, I’d never get to finish. Are three years of my life lost? Wasted? If studying literature was so meaningless, getting the degree wouldn’t last five years at the university, it would be only mentioned in one semester and you’d be done with it! Same is with everything else. You can’t label something simply because it isn’t practical. What would you say about philosophy then? Or sociology? I can name any of the humanities. What about getting a degree in... let’s say... music? mathematics? Or biology? Or history? Are all of these degrees useless? If yes, then how come many of the prestigious colleges offer these degrees? ‘She’s an actress, it can be of use to her’ - excuse me, and to the rest of the people it isn’t? Why do you read literature then? Why do you read novels and stories and such? It’s useless, don’t bother. Go play a video game or find summary on the Internet. It’s practically the same (I’m being sarcastic). ‘What is she studying?’ ‘Oh, it’s just literature’ - so people who study literature do nothing for those five years of college? They just talk and enjoy the leisure... I do beg your pardon! I have so many books on my reading list that I am overwhelmed! I read so much that I am starting to dislike it! I used to enjoy reading! I adored it in high school. When I was younger, my usual average during the summer was 40 books per month! I read them for enjoyment and yet I can’t say much about what I’d read. Now I can’t even think of an author without remembering some of the things mentioned in the class and it’s frustrating! And on top of all those numerous novels we read, we also have other subjects to study, so more reading. Last year I had learnt 1000+ pages of American history. 1000 pages! IN DETAIL! That’s the number of pages you get in average on an exam. So is passing that exam less valuable than for example passing a subject at law school or economy? Why? I have studied for that exam. I have studied for hours and weeks and months - throughout the whole semester, I had studied that subject! I had studied it so much that I thought about it every day - even when I was on my way to the university, I found myself repeating some silly facts I’d remembered. That subject was economy, law, literature, history, philosophy, sociology, culture all in one. Culture, yes! Goodness, culture!! I am very bothered by this. I found myself highly offended by this question. What you study is a matter of choice. With my grades, I could have studied anything I wanted. And I did. I do. I chose literature. That doesn’t make my efforts any lesser than those of someone studying economy or business and it shouldn’t be different from me having chosen pharmaceutical studies or medicine. I am not a lesser person for choosing literature over something else. We all have difficult subjects, easy subjects, subjects you like, subjects you hate, subjects you wish you never had, subjects which are a piece of cake, subjects which we find irrelevant, subjects we barely pass, and so on. Even if you choose to be a teacher - not everyone can be a teacher. It’s a job which requires a lot of dedication, patience and giving - and definitely a lot of time you spend while specialising for the degree. If there were no teachers, we’d have no colleges, no school, no education. And then what?

I'd add Little Dorrit (Dickens) to this list, and Northanger Abbey (Austen), which is a perfect parody of a Gothic novel, so popular of that age. Oh, and Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte - the most popular Gothic novel of then. I am sure there are many more. I liked the beginning of A tale of Two Cities, especially the sentence: ''there was a king and a queen on the throne of England and there was a king and a queen on the throne of France'', which probably isn't quoted correctly, but oh well. It's what I remember. Maybe to get a full picture of Jane Austen you should add Sense and Sensibility to the list or Emma, and if not that one, then surely Mansfield Park. It's simply not enough to read just Pride and Prejudice. Yes, it's the most popular novel of hers, but to understand the country gentry... you need more insight. I could also recommend a lot of critical works on these novels, if you're interested, to help you with reading.

Well, if you love Walden and are so immersed into American transcendentalist literature, you must read Emerson then! His essays are very vivid and fairly short, his poems are also beautiful and he's definitely one of the most erudite men of his age. Whatever Thoreau had written about was present in Emerson's works, especially Nature and The American Scholar. I've enjoyed both very much. Classical literature... well, Bronte sisters are definitely classics, so are Jane Austen, Charles Dickens and many others. If you choose Dickens, I think you'll enjoy most Little Dorrit.

Actually, yes, I use them from time to time, because they help you understand a certain book or a novel better. When you have so many subjects and so little time, you simply can't devote yourself to a book as much as you'd like, so you take all the help you can get. Some things, are wrongly perceived in them. For example, while reading Emerson's The American Scholar, one study guide suggested that nature is the ''opposite of soul'' meant parallel, when it actually meant different (because nature has no soul and humans do...). So, whatever you read, you must bear in mind that you take a risk - you can never be sure whether what you'd read is correct or not.

I've read Taichi Yamada's In Search of a Distant Voice, in English, but I sure can recommend it. The novel is some 200 pages long (which is not that long, really), has some mystery and elements of the Gothic (a ghostly surreal voice of a woman). It was very inspiring when you try to see in which way these two cultures (the Western and the Eastern) perceive the same. Once the mystery is resolved... we still aren't sure what it is. In his mind only or what? I am curious whether you'll find this interesting. I did.

Isn't this strange but nice, fascination with haiku. The poetry in short. Verses are so slim, and only three in the whole, Music in the line. So say what you will, but I must ask one question: Don't you like it too?

Well, this is someone after my own heart. Why not add Old English on the list? It was used until about 1066, when the Norman Conquest brought French influence and the Middle English era began. It is still preserved in old manuscripts of Beowulf and the elegies (The Wanderer, The Seafarer...). It would be wonderful if the section about this language was started. I would be interested in it.

This is curious. That's how Spanish sounds to me. I guess that's because of the specific ''r'' phoneme. Sometimes it's too pronounced in Spanish. It's true that English pronunciation doesn't ''match'' the written word, but once in past it had. I will always remember when our teacher started reading Beowulf. It had a pure Germanic sound that I will never forget. It did remind me a little of German, especially Pearl. I had read some parts aloud and my teacher always told me to try to focus on the German pronunciation more than modern English. It worked. There were several things I had to remember to pronounce differently, but it was mostly German. Now when I think more about it, maybe it sounds hard to them because of the glottal ''h''? Most of the other sounds are somehow gentler, I believe. I have always found alveolar sounds softer. English ''d'' and ''t'' are so much softer than for example Croatian dental ''d'' and ''t'' which are harsh.

Specificity in Gender There are some rules which can help you determine the gender of the noun and it will be useful knowing them. Nouns which are masculine in gender are: names of men (Lucius), nations, rivers (Tiberis, Sequana), winds (aquilo), months (Aprilis) Feminine in gender are: names of women (Cornelia), lands (Aegyptus, Gallia), islands (Delus), cities (Ephesus, Athenae), trees (malus - apple) Additional notes: Whereas the trees are feminine, the fruits are neutral in gender. So if you're referring to an apple tree, you'd say malus, and it would be feminine, but if you're referring to just an apple, it would be malum and neutral in gender. Whereas most cities are feminine in gender, some are not such as Praeneste (neutral). Same is with some lands. There are also rivers which are feminine in gender: Allia, Matrona (river Marne), Lethe, Styx I hope this list is helpful. Sometimes it can help you determine the gender. It's very good to know the difference in between the gender of trees and their fruits, for example, as there are no exceptions there. It also doesn't hurt if you know the general gender the islands, rivers and cities follow, as most of the Latin texts mention them.

Latin Declensions I have enclosed a chart of Latin declensions in this topic. There are five of them - five types of declensions in Latin. The first one is called the ae-declension and it consists of mostly femininum nouns (there's a small number of masculinum nouns as well in this declension, but they all act like femininum nouns, so there's no change). The second one mostly consists of masculinum nouns (endings -us, -er), but also has a large number of neutrum nouns (ending -um). The third one is mixed. More about this later. The fourth one is mostly masculinum as well (-us), but also has a small number of femininum nouns which follow the same pattern as masculinum,so there's no change in the endings. The fifth one consists of femininum nouns. There are only a few of them, though. Only a small number of them have the full declension, most are partial. There are three genders in Latin - masculinum, femininum and neutrum, i.e. masculine, feminine and neutral gender. Where possible they follow the natural genders, but it doesn't have to be. What is most important is to know which noun belongs to which declension as that determines its usage. So, when you're learning new vocabulary, always learn all three columns or else you will always have a lot of questions: aqua, ae, f - water bellum, i, n - war Aqua is the nominative case, aquae is genitive. If you wish to get the base form of this noun, you subtract the genitive suffix ae and get the stem aqu-. That's the stem onto which you add suffix endings. So, to conclude: Stem + Suffix = Noun Stem in Latin usually can't stand alone. Just to introduce the terminology: Stem is the root or main part of a word, to which inflections or formative elements are added. This will help you a lot, especially as some cases of various declensions look the same, so if you know to which declension a noun belongs, there will be no confusion about this.

Latin Cases One of the major differences in between Latin and English are the declension cases. English has none when it comes to nouns. There are actually four cases (according to some grammars, even three) in English but they're only noticeable in the possessive form of the pronouns (he - him). The cases in English are very simplified and sometimes aren't even expressed through suffix (genitive). Example: I am here - subject; nominative case. One of us is missing. - genitive case expressed with ''of'' - phrase: genitive mostly means possession and belonging I am approaching him. - dative case: goal, indirect object I caught a fish. - accusative: direct object The cases in Latin are as follows, in this order: Nominative, Genitive, Dative, Accusative, Vocative, and Ablative. In Latin, these rules for cases remain the same: nominative is used for subject, genitive usually means possession and belonging, dative is either a goal or the case of indirect object whereas accusative is reserved for direct object only. However, Latin also has two more cases: vocative (which is in most cases equivalent in form to nominative), which is used for emphasis (in English, it would be, John, hand me the bag; Mary, stop that, Helen, go away) and ablative. Ablative case is very tricky. It has a lot of meanings. It most commonly means place, though. It can also be used to express a temporal relative clause (similar meaning to after/while/during/when), and a variety of other meanings, most of which are connected to English adverbials (of time, manner, means...). I guess you could call it the case of adverbials.

Well, of course that it's i+1 or else there is no progress, but this also means that there should be implied information that the students understand. I mean, we were complete beginners - we had never encountered Spanish before. We needed something familiar. i+1 can be implemented within various different methods and approaches. I would have loved the audiolingual exercises from time to time, to help us with the vocabulary. I would have loved a bit TBL as well. TPR is ... more for children. It's still questionable when its used in adult classes, especially as there are ''multiple intelligences'' and not everyone learns the same way. I am not a person who responds well to psychical commands. I am what they call a conformist-converger type or learner. I guess I am for multilingual approaches and various methods which include all students and not just the communicative ones.

The Direct method teacher uses only English in the classroom if English is the language being taught (only French, if it's French and so on). Many believe that this is one of the better methods of teaching a foreign language, but I disagree. It all depends on the language levels of your students - teaching English in English for beginners isn't really a good approach. They don't understand a thing. How can you teach them something if they can comprehend about 5 per cent of what you're saying? I had this experience with Spanish. We had a Spanish teacher and she spoke very little Croatian and only the basics of English. It was very difficult to understand her and almost impossible to ask her a question. I still don't speak Spanish, after one whole year of the classes - I can't form a coherent complex sentence. True, I can ask basic questions, but that is only because of my textbook. I put effort into passing the subject. If I hadn't it would have been impossible. Direct approach is good only when you're teaching intermediate students (and upper). It can alienate your beginner students from the subject and make them feel anxious - that isn't good and poses as a barrier to language learning. What do you think?

Verb is the most important part of the sentence in Latin as Latin is a verb-oriented language. In theory, you can have a sentence without any other element but verb in Latin. Scribo means I write. It will be completely correct to simply say Scribo instead of Ego scribo (which is also correct), as Latin favours the usage without pronouns! (the opposite of English). So, Scribo means I write. In a dialogue where someone asks you what you are doing, you can answer with that one word and you will have a complete sentence. This also means that Latin sentence places the special focus on the verb, which is why it is mostly at the ending. Many may wonder why. I do too. Our teacher once told us that the words which you remember the most are the first and the last in the sentence, but better the last as it is fresher in your memory. (I am simplifying things) What also differs from English, but may be similar with some other European languages are the verb endings. I have attached the endings for present ''simple'' tense here with the verb ''amo, amare'' (to love). This verb though, needs an object when you use it. Even in English, just saying ''I love'' isn't a complete sentence. ''I-love-whom'' is the complete form where whom stands for an object in the accusative form. So I could say: Terram amo. - I love the land. (terra, ae, f - land; accusative form for ae-declination is -am ending) Patriam amo. - I love the homeland. (patria, ae, f - homeland, same as terra) Silvam amo. - I love the forest (silva, ae, f - forest is also a noun of ae-declension, so same as terra) In English, verb wouldn't change if you wished to say ''you love the land''. In Latin it does, following the chart I have enclosed. So, the same sentences from before in 2nd person singular: Terram amas. - You love the land. Patriam amas. - You love the homeland. Silvam amas. - You love the forest. The object in accusative form didn't change. It stays in the accusative form! Same would be for the 3rd person singular: Terram amat. - He/She loves the land. Patriam amat. - He/She loves the homeland. Silvam amat. - He/She loves the forest. Anyone wishing to complete the sentences by using the 1st plural form, 2nd plural form and the 3rd plural form of the verbs from the chart? And if I told you that the following nouns had the same pattern of accusative/object form like terra, would you be able to write sentences using them? dea, ae, f - goddess filia, ae, f - daughter aqua, ae, f - water

Do not be dismayed. These verbs are all regular, as far as I could see. They all follow a simple pattern, without exception. I'll take for example iuvo, iuvare, iuvi, iutum which does mean help, but the primary meaning of the verb is to please (and then, to aid, to help): iuvo is the first person singular in present tense, iuvare is the infinitive form which is very important and used commonly in texts, iuvi is the past tense (it's actually ''perfect'', but we can call it past simple, for the time being) and iutum is the past participle form, also used to a great extent. There are four conjugations in Latin. First, second and fourth are very straightforward. The third one is what we call ''mixed''. There are various combinations here, which, of course, every dictionary will list, so again, no worries.

As I have already mentioned elsewhere, I have started to ''liven up'' the Latin section from the other languages subforum. I won't repeat myself much - I'll only say that I'm working on providing you with all the necessary material for successful language learning. I strongly believe that if you wish to learn, all the obstacles become easy to deal with. You just have to be inspired enough to keep going on. That's one of the reasons why many of us who start learning a foreign language fail at an early stage - we don't have someone who's learning with us or guiding us through the process. I hope you'll find both at our little section. There's not much now, but I'm working on improving it every day. At the moment, there's enough to get you started. So, my dear potential students, do join us in Latin reading! You're all welcome! Addendum: Feel free do ask questions and comment on all the lessons, regardless of when they were posted. Language learning is a complex process and it is natural that you will have questions. I will try to answer each and every one of them. Updated 02/12/2014

Every language is complicated, but you simply have to give it a chance. If you don't try, you can't know whether it ''feels'' right for you or not. I too had Latin in school and then I decided to read Latin at the university. I've been studying it for five years, and I haven't regretted my choice. I believe Latin is perfect for me - it somehow makes me feel good while reading texts. I still have so much to learn - I don't think I could possibly learn enough, but I don't give up. If you ever feel like you should do something, go with the flow! The excuse ''I don't have time'' isn't acceptable. There will never be time, if you look at it from a realistic point of view - there will always be something to do, always somewhere to go... but if you keep ignoring what you want, you will never feel fulfilled.

For all of you who wish to learn Latin, I have added several of the basic things into the subforum ''Other Languages'' - > ''Study Latin''. Content At the moment, there are only a few basic pronunciation rules, the alphabet and a few paragraphs on the origin of Latin and its importance, but for the time being, that is enough to keep you occupied. There will, of course, be more in time to come. I will add some basic vocabulary, perhaps some grammar and a few sentences for translation. This is all for basic learners, that is, those who hadn't had contact with Latin before. Are there any of you who had studied Latin before and would like something more difficult? If yes, I will work on that as well, just let me know. Dictionaries You will also find a list of dictionaries there, both online and in paperback, so no worries there. Hopefully, we'll have enough enthusiastic students! Do join us!

This is a classical relative clause which serves as the object complement - this sentence is in the pattern SVO. The structure of this relative clause ''who has suffered'' is defining - we can't omit that as then we wouldn't know who is the object of our ''taking care of''. A similar example: I am looking for a woman who lives with you. If you omit the ''who lives with you'' part, the hearer has no idea to whom the speaker is referring, or I know the secretary who wrote this. (There are a dozens of secretaries, but I know a particular one) A completely different case is this: I live in Paris, which has beautiful parks. (Everyone knows where Paris is - the second part is extra information provided which can also be omitted). It's simply additional information which is optional, not obligatory. There's a similar example in the Bible (1 Peter 4:1 Therefore, since Christ has suffered in the flesh, arm yourselves also with the same purpose, because he who has suffered in the flesh has ceased from sin [...]) but here he is the subject, so you must use a different pronoun - that is, the nominative case. Him is accusative case used for object. Though, of course, you can always say this in two sentences: Take care of him. He has suffered. Defining relative clauses aren't separated from the rest of the sentence with commas. Only non-defining. I am still going to check the grammar book to be sure as this differs from the usual defining relative clause as object where you can omit the pronoun (in which case you usually have another subject)

As the very title says, learning one language is not the same as acquiring it. Children have that innate ability of ''picking up'' the language merely by being exposed to it, which doesn't work that way with adults or older children. This makes the process of learning the language more difficult and a conscious effort. Whereas acquisition is an unconscious process and happens naturally, learning requires your full participation and effort. The trend is to try to imitate the background and circumstances of the acquisition in the classroom, but the question is - how successful is that really? Can we create an atmosphere which would replicate that of home? How successfully and in what degree can we teach children by using the acquisition methods? This certainly doesn't work with adults as they mostly learn through ''prior experience'' and are more disciplined and focused - but does that serve as an advantage or the very opposite of it? I'm interested in your opinions. Please, feel free to share them.

For me, speaking is the most difficult one, writing the easiest. I'd always preferred writing to speaking. I guess that's just the way I function. One reason is definitely the lack of time when you speak. If you're writing something down, you always have enough time to, if nothing else, organise your thoughts and come up with a perfect solution. You even have enough time to fix something, if you believe it should be fixed. With speaking, it's different. Once you say something, it's difficult to correct it. You can, true, but it's not the same. Though, lately, I have a different problem - once I start writing I can't stop. When you have only about five minutes per question on an exam and you can't stop writing, this definitely starts to worry you. I'm still working on shortening my sentences and paragraphs.

Not sure whether this answers your question, but to me, English sounds resonant. Various accents, though, can change this. I don’t like generalising, but it seems I’ll have to. My native language is Croatian, which is a Slavic language. The pronunciation of Slavic languages is very straightforward and quick, at times, the words feel chopped (that’s what people usually say when they listen to me speak my native language, but I wouldn’t know for sure). I dislike American accents in general as the words in their pronunciation are lengthened - sometimes that can give you a feeling of endlessness and the phoneme ‘r’ isn’t really nice to hear. RP has ‘r’ pronounced only when it’s immediately followed by a vowel sound, which isn’t in GAm (General American pronunciation). Most of their dialects are rhotic - they emphasise this ‘r’ phoneme which many find annoying. This, though, isn’t the case with all American dialects - New York (which is also non-rhotic, like RP) has a sharper and faster pronunciation from example the lenient drawl of the Texans. I come from a society where being precise is very important. The RP appeals to me more from that reason exactly - the words are sharp, the intonation can vary, and the rhythm is dynamic. Of course, there are many dialects in the UK which are difficult to follow. Take for example the difference in between Northumberland and Kent. Penelope Lively had put this very nicely in one of her novels. She’d called Somerset speech a ruminative buzz and Cockney staccato scatter-shot (not sure how the original sentence of hers sounded). I guess that sums it up nicely. (I don't mean to offend anyone, so please, don't take this personally - I'm trying to see this in a linguistic point of view)

Syllables and Accent in Latin It seemed to me that I would overwhelm you if I added this in my previous topic with pronunciation, so I decided to give this a special attention, just a little bit about syllables and accents in Latin. Syllables Latin vowels can be both long and short. Latin diphthongs are always long. This helps determine the length of the syllables. Latin syllables can be long: - by nature/naturally if they contain a long vowel or diphthong, e.g. flos (flower) vita (life), Caesar, aurum (gold) - most good dictionaries actually tell you whether the syllable is long or short by nature - by position if they contain a short vowel which is followed by two or more consonants, e.g. arbor, dux (x is actually ks, so that counts as two). It may seem that the length of a syllable is not really important, but it actually is. It can change the meaning of the word, take for example liber - with short i, liber means book and it's a noun; with long i, it means free and is an adjective. Another example could be malum - with short a, it means evil, with long apple. Accent in Latin The first and foremost rule: Latin words are accentuated from the end, not the beginning. The accent can be on the last syllable, the penultimate syllable and the third from the back (which are, actually, in Latin the first, the second and the third). The similar system is in Ancient Greek as well - the syllables are counted from the end of the word to the beginning, and they too can be only on the last three (from our perspective, from their perspective, it's actually the first three). If a word has only two syllables, the accent is on the penultimate one (that is on the ''second'' as would be more proper to say), e.g. vita, pater, mater, terra If a word has three or more syllables, the accent is on the third from the back (or simply, ''third'', if you adopt the Latin way of counting them) if the syllable is short, e.g. Cicero (-ce- is short), populus (both po- and -pu- are short here) and on the penultimate (or the ''second'', really) if the syllable is long, e.g. natura (-tu- is long here). I know that this sounds very abstract and technical, but we have to start from somewhere, don't we? These are the very basic things and they are actually very important. You can't read Latin without them (not properly, at least). But, if it makes it any easier, I didn't like this part of the grammar either.

Many people don't use dictionaries in paperback, so I decided to share with you several good websites which you can use. Of course, if you're looking for a dictionary to buy, the best are Oxford Dictionary, Lewis-Short Dictionary and Collins Dictionary, so take your pick. I use the combination of the first two. When it comes to the dictionaries online, the best would be LatinDict. It offers both the translation of the word and the basic grammatical information about the word you're looking for. Perseus is good when you wish to see in which text a particular word was used and Free Latin Dictionary is for fairly basic usage. Lexilogos offers a variety of websites you can view (and translations in other languages, not only English). For example, for those of you who speak French, DicoLatin is perfect and probably preferable to LatinDict or Free Latin Dictionary. Here's the list with working links: LatinDict ( http://www.latin-dictionary.net/ ) Perseus ( http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/ ) Free Latin Dictionary ( http://www.latin-dictionary.org/ ) Lexilogos ( http://www.lexilogos.com/english/latin_dictionary.htm ) DicoLatin ( http://www.dicolatin.com/EN/LAT/0/dictionary-latin-french.htm )