Blog: Siliquasparsiones: Podcasts in Latin

In order to prepare for the SCS’s upcoming sesquicentennial at the annual meeting in San Diego from January 3–6, 2019, the SCS blog is highlighting panels, keynotes, and workshops from the schedule. This week we are focusing on the Podcasting the Classics panel (8:00am–10:30am on Saturday, Jan. 5) by pointing to some resources for those who want to explore the medium more fully.

One of the best ways to build fluency in a language is to listen to that language being spoken at a comprehensible level of complexity. This is no less true for Latin than for any other language, but until recently the options for listening to Latin being spoken were limited, especially for those unable to travel to the various spoken-Latin colloquia around the country (e.g., the Paideia Institute’s “Living Latin,” Dickinson College’s Conventiculum Dickinsoniense, UMass-Boston’s Conventiculum Bostoniense). Podcasting has changed that. There now exists a full lineup of podcasts in Latin that allow anyone interested in developing an ability to hear, and ultimately speak, Latin to practice whenever is convenient for them, with new content being added all the time. With hosts that hail from many different countries, these podcasts hearken back to the time when Latin was a language of international exchange.

Philologia Perennis (w/ Patrick Owens and Tom Keeline)

https://www.podomatic.com/podcasts/philologiaperennis

Sermones between Patrick Owens, current curator of the Lexicon Morganianum, and Thomas Keeline. Topics range from the lofty (“de arte oratoria”) to the everyday (“quaestionibus nullius momenti”).

Quomodo Dicitur (w/ Gus Grissom, Jason Slanga, Justin Slocum Bailey, and Catherine Reed)

https://quomododicitur.com

Weekly podcast featuring conversations in Latin between several hosts: Active Latin guru Justin Slocum-Bailey, Gus Grissomm, Jason Slanga, and now in the second season, Catherine Reed. Topics of conversation range widely, from everyday activities such as exercise or what to do on summer vacation, to discussions of the content of ancient Latin texts such as Pliny’s or Cicero’s letters.

Sermones Raedarii (w/ Alessandro Conti)

https://sermonesraedarii.podomatic.com

Frequently updated show featuring the host speaking about wide-ranging topics, usually while driving his car. Feed includes fabulae raedariae, easy to understand retellings of famous fairy tales such as Pulchra Dormiens or Alba Nix, as well as a series of episodes in ancient Greek, called βαρβαρισμός, and offering Sermones Graeci Faciles.

Latinitium (w/ Daniel Pettersson)

https://www.latinitium.com/loci-et-locutiones

Video series discussing the meaning and context of memorable phrases from Latin literature, such as onus Aetna gravius (Cicero, De Senectute 4.5) or oculi emissicii (Plautus, Aulularia 41).

In Foro Romano

https://soundcloud.com/in-foro-romano

Conversations between three friends—Abigail, Lída, and Anna—who live thousands of miles apart in Prague, Granada, and Mexico City but who are bound together by speaking Latin (and sometimes ancient Greek). The focus is pointedly contemporary and colloquial (discussions of the differences between lingua Hispanica in Spain and Mexico, trips to Oxford and Rome, and so forth.

Nuntii Latini (w/ Reijo Pitkäranta and Tuomo Pekkanen)

https://yle.fi/nuntii

A contemporary and global news bulletin produced weekly by the Finnish Broadcasting Company since 1989, Nuntii Latini is one of the oldest Latin-only audio programs in the world. Episodes run ca. 5 minutes and the website includes transcripts for each.

Nuntii Latini Vasintonienses (w/ Miller Krause)

http://nuntiilatini.com

A weekly podcast recorded by second-year Latin students at Western Washington University that follows a format similar to the Finnish Nuntii Latini (i.e., 5-minute episodes reporting on contemporary events with transcripts on the website).

Curtis Dozier teaches Greek and Roman Studies at Vassar College. He is the producer and host of The Mirror of Antiquity podcast, and the director of Pharos: Doing Justice to the Classics. (Photo Credit: ©Walter Garschagen/Vassar College)

Christopher Polt is an Assistant Professor and Graduate Program Director in Classical Studies at Boston College. His research focuses on Latin poetry of the late Republic and early Empire.

Header Image: Sculpture of a Roman theater mask in Baths of Diocletian, Rome (Image via Wikimedia under a CC-BY-SA 4.0).