Title: Latinity and literary society at Rome
First published: 1997
Description: Latinity and Literary Society at Rome reaches back to the early Roman empire to examine attitudes toward Latinity, reviewing the contested origins of scholarly Latin in the polemical arena of Roman literature. W. Martin Bloomer shows how that literature's reflections on correct and incorrect speech functioned as part of a wider understanding of social relations and national identity in Rome.

Bloomer's investigation begins with questions about the sociology of Latin literature - what interests were served by the creation of high style and how literary stylization constituted a system of social decorum - and goes on to offer readings of selected texts.

Through studies of works ranging from Varro's De lingua latina to the verse fables of Augustus's freedman Phaedrus to the Annals of Tacitus, Bloomer examines conflicting claims to style not simply to set true Latin against vulgarism but also to ask who is excluding whom, why, and by what means.

These texts exemplify the ways Roman literature employs representations of and reflections on proper and improper language to mirror the interests of specific groups who wished to maintain or establish their place in Roman society. They show how writers sought to influence the fundamental social issue of who had the power to confer legitimacy of speech and how their works used claims of linguistic propriety to reinforce the definition of "Romanness.".

Through Bloomer's study Latinity emerges as a contested field of identity and social polemic heretofore unrecognized in classical scholarship. With its fresh interpretations of major and minor texts, Latinity and Literary Society at Rome is a literary history that significantly advances our understanding of the place of language in ancient Rome.
Subjects: Ancient Rhetoric, Books and reading, Civilization, History and criticism, Latin language, Latin literature, Literature and society, Rhetoric, Ancient, Social aspects, Social aspects of Latin language, Latin literature, history and criticism, Rome, civilization, Littérature latine, Histoire et critique, Latin (Langue), Aspect social, Littérature et société, Livres et lecture, Rhétorique ancienne, Civilisation, 18.46 ancient Latin literature, Latijn, Letterkunde, Literair leven
Places: Rome
LC classification: PA6019 .B58 1997