Latin? That’s why it’s still useful, even at work

Too often we underestimate the role that so-called soft skill, transversal skills, have in our professional success; yet, often these are at the top of the evaluation tables of headhunters, those who recruit professionals on behalf of companies. Having a casual relationship with one’s own language, for example, and knowing how to exploit the performative traits, that is, those that make things happen, gives an extra gear. We also build a large part of our relationships through language and we all know all too well how much they affect our careers, for better or for worse.

And to get to even broader considerations, it is never superfluous to remember that our thoughts take shape through the words we know; an aphorism of the philosopher Wittengstein is emblematic in this regard: “The limits of my language are the limits of my world».

When it comes to language, we never stop learning and we can all draw food for thought and new awareness from everyday life. After all, our WhatsApp messages are made up of words, our professional emails too, and our relationships with colleagues and superiors are essentially built through words.

Of course, not everything can be drawn from the stimuli that daily life offers us. In this sense, education, at all levels, plays a crucial role. A recent initiative by the State of Milan which extended the obligation of the Latin exam, already foreseen for those who attend Literature, also to students of Sciences of Cultural Heritage and History. Literature, some basic vocabulary, textual analysis of emblematic passages in the original language and notions on the cultural context that generated them: the students of these courses will thus be able to reach the level A2 / B1 of the linguistic certification of Latin. The rector of the University himself, Elio Franzini, defined it as “a choice that goes against the trend, indeed a real challenge, with which the Statale intends to reiterate and promote the centrality of Latin as the language of the common roots of European civilization».

At such news there are not a few who could raise an eyebrow. The comments are always the same, including “Latin is a dead language”, “Latin is useless”, “because instead of teaching really useful things you waste time on this nonsense?”. Here, for all the usual observations that leave the time they find, we refer you to gallery at the beginning of this article where the professors Chiara Torre and Paola Moretti della Statale have identified five reasons why Latin is still precious today; starting from a numerical consideration that can be useful even for the most skeptical: English, perceived by many as the “most useful” language of all (but in this article we propose a more extensive reflection), “must” about 60 % of his words, directly or indirectly, in Latin.

Furthermore, let’s not forget that the study (and, to be honest, to a greater extent the use) of multiple language systems has beneficial effects on our brain, including that of delaying cognitive decline as explained by Maria Garraffa, Antonella Sorace and Maria Vender in their “The bilingual brain»(Carocci). But that’s not all: learning more languages ​​helps you to understand more easily (and to use it for your own purposes) the way in which language works in general; it also contributes to the acquisition of a more extensive vocabulary within each language that is known, an even more significant detail in the case of Latin, the mother tongue of Italian and of many other languages ​​spoken in Europe.

(Photo: unsplash.com).