Alexandros wrote:As already provided by definition a "dead language" is that which bears absolutely no native speakers, so when you prove that the Latin language is taught not for purely educational purposes but to bestow them with the absolute essentials for communication in their everyday lives, then and only then is your argument considered of some value.
Potemkin wrote:There are scholars who can speak ancient Sumerian. Does this mean that ancient Sumerian is not a dead language? To try to argue that Latin or ancient Assyrian or Sumerian are not dead languages is simply intellectual perversity. If no-one speaks a language as his or her mother tongue, then it is a dead language. Quod erat demonstrandum.
Hmmm... some would object that it is not exactly the same. And I think you may be wrong.
There isn't any place where you'll find people (be they even scholars) speaking in Sumerian or Assyrian as a common, vehicular language.
And you won't find any contemporary texts or documents printed in Sumerian
nowadays. I mean: texts relating to contemporary events, still printed in Sumerian.
Yet all this still happens in Latin. Which is still used as an official language for texts and documents in Vatican, and which is spoken as a sort of lingua franca by religious members - even if not by all of them, of course.
Don't forget that Latin is among the official languages spoken in Vatican, by the way, as others have pointed out.
And - I can assure you - it is really spoken by some priests not sharing the same mother tongue.
During a holiday in Rome I was staying at a hotel near Vatican City, where various priests, sisters and religious members form all over the world where staying as well, and while having breakfast I was bemused to overhear conversations being held in Latin as well as in other languages.
Would you find something similar with people using Sumerian or Assyrian or another dead language for
communicative purpose?
Here is an article where a Latinist laments that Latin is almost extinct, dying out (which means... not already dead):
Latinist laments 'dying language'
One of the world's foremost scholars in Latin has said he believes the language is dying out.
Father Reginald Foster, who was appointed the papal Latinist 38 years ago, says Latin is almost extinct.
He says priests are no longer compelled to study it at seminaries and find it impossible to read important theological texts.
Father Foster has also condemned the loss of Latin teaching in schools across most of Europe.
'Missing out'
Father Foster has just opened a new Latin academy in Rome near the Pantheon, in his final effort to preserve the official language of the priesthood.
He hopes to attract 130 students a year.
But the chief Latinist, who has translated speeches and letters for four popes, says he can see no future for the language he is teaching and has been forced to acknowledge that Latin is dying out.
The reason is that more junior members of the Catholic hierarchy are less enthusiastic about Latin than the recent Popes.
At the Vatican, bishops appointments are still written on papyrus in Latin as are letters of congratulations from the pope, but many bishops and cardinals write back asking for translations.
He has also condemned the loss of Latin teaching in Europe.
In Italy, most schoolchildren are still taught Latin for at least four hours a week until they are 18.
But in other European countries it has been replaced by the more modern languages.
Father Foster believes that without Latin they are missing out on important elements of history.
"St Augustine thought in Latin, you can't read his text in English, it's like listening to Mozart through a jukebox," he says.
Reports that Pope Benedict XVI might re-introduce Latin mass are way off the mark says Father Foster, not least because of the pontiff's desire to avoid more controversy.
In any case, he says, it just makes the Vatican look medieval. Father Foster does, however, propose a solution - he has called on the Pope to lead by example.
Instead of a siesta, he says, Benedict should announce that he will be reading Latin in his Vatican quarters.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/6308281.stm