Roman Social Justice

Latin Privilege

It’s come to my attention that some of the people following this blog - and, indeed, some of the people on Tumblr generally - do not speak Latin, the language of the empire. On the one hand, I’m glad you don’t - I was brutally forced into learning it and for me it was a deeply traumatic act of violence - but I recognise that this does give me privilege in this case, since Romans are so ethnocentric they’ll treat me just a little bit more like a human being because I can speak to them in their language.

If any of you feel like I’m ignoring or flaunting my Latin privilege, please tell me. I am trying to work on this and on the internalised shame I feel towards my own language, which was brainwashed into me when I went through my intensive Latin language programme. If you require translation, too, please tell me.