The Latin Language and Native Survivance in North America

Abstract:This article discusses a representative sampling of texts from the 17th century to today in which indigenous writers of North America reflect on or make use of the Latin language, simultaneously no one's native language and marker of that European antiquity which has played a distinct role in colonizing processes on a continent which has its own still-living antiquity. With varying emphases, strategies, and effects, sometimes reflecting on education in general and language learning in particular, and not infrequently talking back to prejudiced or misinformed views of Native culture, these writers have cumulatively and collectively contributed to what has been called indigenous survivance. I end by considering some implications for those who study and teach Greco-Roman antiquity in North America today.