Don't Use Latin Roots to Critique Encampments, FFS

arguments from etymology are the lowest, smarmiest form of hollow posturing

When I was in ninth grade, I wrote a report on the medieval witch-hunting manual Malleus Maleficarum for history because of course I did. I was only recently out of my own adolescent witchcraft phase, which marked the beginning of a lifelong obsession with how men rationalize misogyny, so it ticked alllll my boxes. Among the many faux-scientific, specious declarations made in the text, one that leapt out to me was the author’s claim that of course women are fundamentally sinful, because the word “woman” (femina) literally means “less faith” (fe + minus).

Even at age 14, I strongly suspected this was bullshit, and I was correct. A of all, this etymology is completely wrong — femina from the same PIE root as fetus, so the femina is the one who nurses/nourishes and the fetus is the one who is nourished. But, more importantly, who cares???

Etymology proves nothing. The fact that the word femina is related to breastfeeding doesn’t mean that all women can or should breastfeed. Claiming that the etymology of a word contains a seed of deep, incontrovertible truth about its essential nature is specious and absurd. Obviously.

I was reminded of all this yesterday, when I saw this tweet about my alma mater:

There is so much that enrages me about this screenshot. First and foremost: student protests are a sign that education and freedom of expression are working as intended, and they should be supported and not beaten down. I’ve been shocked, horrified, and baffled watching how university campuses are responding to peaceful demonstrations recently. Students should be applauded for taking action in their communities. They are participating in and perpetuating a long, rich history of student protests all over the world that have led to real and very important political change. Good for them.

I’m not currently part of a university community, so I don’t want to speak too much to what’s happening over there — I know some colleagues are working on a piece over at

Pasts Imperfect

that I’ll share soon. So let’s zero in on the highlighted part of the tweet and its caution that encampments are inherently militaristic because of the “etymological connections of the word to military origins”.

This claim is almost as bad as the one I fact-checked in my ninth-grade report. I say “almost” only because the Malleus Maleficarum’s etymology was actual gibberish, while I believe that the president of UChicago does know that “encampment” comes from campus. Unfortunately for him, there isn’t inherently a militaristic meaning of campus, which refers to a flat plain. Possibly he is thinking of the Campus Martius, which did have military uses, but… that’s pretty thin. Also, as this follow-up tweet points out, I have bad, bad news for him about the origins of the word “campus” as it’s more generally used to refer to the physical location of a university.

I do regret to say that, to the people in her replies arguing that his objections to “encampment” should also apply to the word “march,” it isn’t clear that the word “march” used in this sense is actually related to the Latin martius (aka related to Mars, the god of war). March the month, yes. Marching band… not necessarily. It comes from the French marcher, which might have Germanic roots.

But all of this is beside the point, because again: who cares?!

My ex sometimes likes to tell a story about one of her first Latin teachers, who cheerfully told the class that one of the best parts of learning the language was that you could use it as an intellectual bludgeon. I like to think she was joking, because if not, woof.¹ Take it from a classicist: dropping some Greek and Latin etymology into conversation to make yourself seem impossibly erudite is a really bad look. Most people will just say “So what?”, and the people who actually know Latin and Greek will say “Well, actually…” It’s a lose-lose proposition.

And look, I get it. The scale of human suffering happening in Gaza right now is so immense that it’s become hard and painful to even try to reckon with it (although not, of course, as hard and painful as it is for the people who live there). And these student protesters taking up space on our campus are refusing to let us forget and go about our lives as usual, and that’s uncomfortable. So we’d rather talk about purely theoretical concepts and hypotheticals and etymologies, which feel safe and exist in a world of ideas that feels comfortably padded from the excruciating reality of existing in an interconnected human community. I get it! It’s cowardly but super legible. Also, possibly the most U of C thing I’ve ever heard. I loved my experience as a student there, but it’s absolutely the kind of place that is friendlier to physics problems with perfectly spherical cows than reckonings with the environmental impact of the beef industry.

An argument from etymology is a weak alternative to an actual argument. It uses the appearance of erudition to shore up a lack of substantive critique. It’s a kind of just-so story, the equivalent of casually dropping a fable about some animals into your attempts to chill campus free speech (all while using DARVO tactics to claim that, actually, it’s the protests that are having the chilling effect on free speech!).

It makes you look like an idiot. Incidentally, did you know that while “moron” comes from an ancient Greek word that means “foolish”, “idiot” comes from a word that means “somebody who doesn’t engage in political activity”? The Greek idios means “one’s own,” so an idiotes is somebody who only cares about their own life. Which is to say, the students protesting genocide are, objectively, the opposite of idiots in the etymological sense of the word (and, in my subjective opinion, also in the English sense of the word). Which doesn’t matter. It’s somewhat entertaining as a historical tangent, sure, but notice that I didn’t actually add anything of substantive value to the conversation about campus protests with this fun little trip down Etymology Lane?

I’ll let XKCD have the final word on this (although this one is great and relevant too):

This is what you sound like.

1. Although I will say that the teacher in question was a rare non-Ph.D. teaching at the University of Chicago, so maybe she felt like she needed to throw around her Latin chops more than most.