Quid pro quo: We all speak Latin
In the conversations around the impeachment hearings in Washington, DC, I hear some people saying that the term bribery or extortion should be used instead of quid pro quo, since most people don’t know or understand Latin.
I can see that: Not everyone is an attorney or a judge, and Latin is often referred to as a “dead language.”
All the same, lots of people have seen the movie Silence of the Lambs, in which Dr. Lecter and Agent Starling have a quid pro quo arrangement, and they use that term more than once: “Quid pro quo,” intones Dr. Lecter, “I tell you things, you tell me things.”
OK, you might say, but that’s just a movie: That’s not how real people speak.
On the contrary! As I used to remind my students back when I taught English, we all speak Latin — every day, all the time.
For example, the phrase “for example” in Latin is exempli gratia, which we abbreviate as “e.g.” when we write. Now sometimes, we might confuse “e.g.” with “i.e.,” which is also Latin, for id est, or “that is.” We use “e.g.” when we are giving an example, and we use “i.e.” for clarification: i.e., when we want to explain or elaborate on something.
I learned that distinction in college, at my alma mater (Latin for generous mother). My real mother would want me to add that I graduated college with honors: magna cum laude, which is also Latin.
Going to a good school was helpful to my c.v., which is an abbreviation of curriculum vitae (Latin for course of one’s life), or résumé.
And around the time I was in college, a popular movie was Dead Poets Society, in which an English teacher encouraged his students to carpe diem: Latin for Seize the day.
If you like Marvel Comics and have repeated Stan Lee’s signature cry of “Excelsior!” — Latin for Ever upward! — you are speaking Latin.
If you’ve ever talked about going to a ComicCon incognito or as your alter ego, you are speaking Latin again.
The U.S. Marines all speak Latin: Semper fidelis or, for short, Semper fi (always faithful) is their motto.
And have you ever had a rough airplane or boat ride and said you were glad to be back on terra firma? Latin again.
Likewise, if you’ve ever asked your company for a per diem or have calculated something per capita.
When someone dies, we may mention it on social media with the message R.I.P., which is Latin for requiescat in pace — or, in English, Rest in peace.
We may pay tribute to the deceased with the Latin words in memoriam, and we may even find it helpful to have a reminder to ourselves that we, too, we will die one day — in Latin, a memento mori.
I like pie!
Oh, pardon me — that was just me saying something strangely out of context: a non sequitur, Latin for it does not follow.
Have you ever done that? If so: Et tu, Brute?
I could go on and on with common Latin words and phrases — I could go on ad nauseum, in fact — so let me adduce a few more things in Latin that people say a lot: vice versa, verbatim, habeus corpus, magnum opus, and sic semper tyrannis.
If you have a dollar in your pocket, take it out and look at it: There’s Latin again. Annuit coeptis is Latin for He (God) has blessed our undertaking and Novus ordo seclorum is new order of the ages.
And of course, on our coins, is e pluribus unum: Latin for out of the many, one.
This isn’t even getting into how many words in the English language have roots in Latin! The word extortion, for example, comes from the Latin root meaning “to wrest.”
This is just one of the many ways that the English language is rich, diverse, and full of fascinating history.
Make no mistake: Latin is very much alive!
If you liked this article, check out my podcast THE BEATLES’ ENGLISH, in which I use songs from my favorite band to talk about the English language. You can find the podcast on Apple Podcasts or you can download or listen to it on my website.
