This blew up! A few people have raised the same issue, so I’d like to clarify something.

I was talking about a phenomenon in the UK of using minorities as a prop in the language debate. It overlaps with a separate tendency to see UK issues through the lens of US politics. 1/5 https://twitter.com/livyaugusta/status/1335233324940472326

Ironically it seems my own thread didn’t make it clear I was speaking from a UK perspective.

I support reform to language teaching & assessment. There are long-standing inequities in both, but these are drowned out by the Classics/Class Civ debate in our mostly white field. 2/5

The point I was trying to make was that I think some white scholars, perhaps well-meaning, have seen the US rhetoric of institutional violence and taken it to use as a weapon in this UK debate.

They aren’t doing any more for our representation than the people they criticise. 3/5

The nuanced use of the word violence to apply to non-literally-violent aspects of violent conquest is totally reasonable. Some POC, esp in US, see language testing in that context. I respect that, though it’s not for me to say.

But the usage I was talking about ain’t that.

4/5

Someone with ancestors who suffered imperial rule might have a different view of how Latin & Greek were propagated.

I think such views, no more subjective than historicism, should be recognised & validated.

Not fobbed off with Translations for Minorities. That’s all.

5/5