In an article, ‘The Slaves were Happy’: High School Latin and the Horrors of Classical Studies, Erik Robinson, a Latin teacher from a public high school in Texas, criticises how, in his experience, Classics teaching tends to avoid in-depth discussions on issues such as the brutality of war, the treatment of women and the experience of slaves (Robinson, 2017). However, texts such as the article ‘Teaching Sensitive Topics in the Secondary Classics Classroom’ (Hunt, 2016), and the book ‘From abortion to pederasty: addressing difficult topics in the Classics classroom’ (Sorkin Rabinowitz & McHardy, 2014) strongly advocate for teachers to address these difficult and sensitive topics. They argue that the historical distance between us and Greco-Roman culture and history can allow students to engage and participate in discussions that may otherwise be difficult and can provide a valuable opportunity to address uncomfortable topics in the classroom. Thus, Robinson's assertion that Classics teaching avoids these sensitive topics may not be so definitive. Regardless, Robinson claims that honest confrontations in the classroom with the ‘legacy of horror and abuse’ from the ancient world can be significantly complicated by many introductory textbooks used in Latin classes, such as the Cambridge Latin Course (CLC), one of the most widely used high school Latin textbooks in use in both America and the United Kingdom (Robinson, 2017). In particular, Robinson views the presentation of slavery within the CLC as ‘rather jocular and trivialising’ which can then hinder a reader's perspective on the realities of the violent and abusive nature of the Roman slave trade (Robinson, 2017). As far as he was concerned, the problem lay with the characterisation of the CLC's slave characters Grumio and Clemens, who, he argued, were presented there as happy beings and seemingly unfazed by their positions as slaves. There was never any hint in the book that Grumio or Clemens were unhappy with their lives or their positions as slaves, even though, as the CLC itself states in its English background section on Roman slavery, Roman law ‘did not regard slaves as human beings, but as things that could be bought or sold, treated well or badly, according to the whim of their master’ (CLC I, 1998, p. 78). One might argue, therefore, that there seems to be a disconnect between the English language information we learn about the brutality of the Roman slave trade provided in the background section of Stage 6, and what we can infer about Roman slavery from the Latin language stories involving our two ‘happy’ slaves.

中文翻译：

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对七年级学生对罗马奴隶制的看法进行批判性调查，剑桥拉丁课程的故事就证明了这一点

在一篇文章中，“奴隶们很快乐”：高中拉丁语和古典研究的恐怖，德克萨斯州一所公立高中的拉丁语教师埃里克·罗宾逊批评，在他的经验中，经典教学倾向于避免深入讨论诸如战争的残暴、妇女的待遇和奴隶的经历等问题（罗宾逊, 2017)。然而，诸如“在中学经典课堂中教授敏感话题”（Hunt，2016 年）一文和“从堕胎到娼妓：解决经典课堂中的难题”（Sorkin Rabinowitz 和 McHardy，2014 年）一书等文本强烈主张让教师解决这些困难和敏感的话题。他们认为，我们与希腊罗马文化和历史之间的历史距离可以让学生参与和参与原本可能很困难的讨论，并且可以提供一个宝贵的机会来解决课堂上令人不安的话题。因此，罗宾逊关于经典教学避免这些敏感话题的断言可能不是那么确定。无论如何，罗宾逊声称，在课堂上与来自古代世界的“恐怖和虐待的遗产”进行坦诚的对抗可能会因拉丁语课程中使用的许多介绍性教科书而变得非常复杂，例如剑桥拉丁语课程(CLC)，这是美国和英国使用最广泛的高中拉丁语教科书之一（Robinson，2017 年）。特别是，罗宾逊认为奴隶制在CLC作为“相当诙谐和琐碎”，这可能会阻碍读者对罗马奴隶贸易的暴力和虐待性质的现实的看法（Robinson，2017）。就他而言，问题在于CLC的奴隶角色格鲁米奥和克莱门斯，他认为，他们在那里被描绘成快乐的存在，并且似乎对他们作为奴隶的地位毫不在意。书中从未暗示格鲁米奥或克莱门斯对他们的生活或奴隶地位不满意，尽管作为CLC其本身在其关于罗马奴隶制的英文背景部分中指出，罗马法“并不将奴隶视为人，而是将其视为可以根据主人的心血来潮买卖、善待或恶待的东西”（CLC我，1998 年，第 78)。因此，有人可能会争辩说，我们在第 6 阶段的背景部分中了解到的关于罗马奴隶贸易的残酷性的英语信息与我们从拉丁语故事中可以推断出的关于罗马奴隶制的信息之间似乎存在脱节。涉及我们两个“快乐”的奴隶。