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Esperanto a waste of time? | ||
 Language Learning Forum : Esperanto |  | |
| davidwelsh Heptaglot Senior Member Norway Joined 5537 days ago 141 posts - 307 votes  Speaks: Lowland Scots, English*, Norwegian, Esperanto, Swedish, Danish, French Studies: Polish, Sanskrit, Tibetan, Pali, Mandarin | Message 177 of 351 17 January 2010 at 11:22am | IP Logged | ||||||||
The primary factor that makes Esperanto easier for anyone to learn than a natural language like French or English is not the source of its vocabulary but its regular grammar and agglutinative character. The key to mastering Esperanto it mastering the affix system. Once you've learned the 40 or so affixes, you can construct a myriad of words from the one root word you've learned. So once you've learned the root for to learn (lern-), you don't have to learn the words for learner (lernanto), school (lernejo), headmistress/principal (lernejestrino), learning (lernado), something worth learning (lernindaĵo) etc. etc. separately. 9 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||
| davidwelsh Heptaglot Senior Member Norway Joined 5537 days ago 141 posts - 307 votes Speaks: Lowland Scots, English*, Norwegian, Esperanto, Swedish, Danish, French Studies: Polish, Sanskrit, Tibetan, Pali, Mandarin | Message 178 of 351 17 January 2010 at 11:30am | IP Logged | ||||||||
I do find it interesting that people who don't speak Esperanto can make such absolute statements based on abstract theories. I wonder how you would explain the fact that many people do use Esperanto as a lingua franca, do experience it as vastly more neutral than other forms of intercultural communication, and find that the words we use do in fact have nuances - and often a richness of meaning that we are unable to obtain in our native languages. How have we attained these supposedly impossible feats I wonder? 9 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||
| Gusutafu Senior Member Sweden Joined 5529 days ago 655 posts - 1039 votes Speaks: Swedish* | Message 179 of 351 17 January 2010 at 5:52pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
Perhaps the two of you have different ideas on what constitutes "many" and "lingua franca". In reality, Esperanto is almost only used as a lingua franca on Esperanto conferences, which in turn are organised with this in mind. TThe situation when two strangers meet accidentally, or for business, and use Esperanto as a means of communication is pretty rare, wouldn't you say? And again, in what sense is Esperanto neutral? It is one the most overtly political languages ever heard, so you must mean something else. More importantly, how many people (apart from a few thousand Esperanto enthusiasts) actually care about language "neutrality" at all? I've never met anyone in real life. 4 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||
| cordelia0507 Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 5846 days ago 1473 posts - 2176 votes Speaks: Swedish* Studies: German, Russian | Message 180 of 351 17 January 2010 at 7:41pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
They haven't had time to think about it. Too busy trying to learn irregular verbs in English, prounounce the "th" sound and work out where to put the emphasis in "dandelion" or "highbrow" and thousands more... Their career may depend on this. I bet half of France and Spain would prefer Esperanto as Lingua Franca over English. But they are not here to say so because their English isn't good enough (as a rule) to participate in a forum like this. It's not like the world took a vote on this and decided that English was ideal. It is the result of the dominance of the USA after ww2 and the influence of the old British Empire. Imagine how much nicer and more interesting this forum would be if it was truly international instead of having a huge majority of native English speakers. In a different world (parallelll Universe) where Esperanto was the Lingua Franca we would not have a situation where some people see participation in this forum as "language practice" while others chat away in their mother tongue. No specific culture/language/world view would be dominant. Everybody on the forum would be writing in a foreign language (to them)and they would know what it means to REALLY learn a language to a high standard. (many people here don't). It would benefit everyone. 5 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||
| daristani Senior Member United States Joined 7152 days ago 752 posts - 1661 votes Studies: Uzbek | Message 181 of 351 17 January 2010 at 9:22pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
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I generally don't comment on, or even read, the interminable arguments about the virtues or lack thereof of Esperanto, and as a "non-enthusiast", some might consider that I have nothing to say on the issue.
But I would like to point out that Francois started the forum as an English-language forum for discussion of learning foreign languages, and the population of the users has developed largely on that basis. While some might wish that the forum didn't have a "huge majority" of native English speakers, there is nothing to stop such members from establishing or participating in "nicer and more interesting" fora in Esperanto or other "neutral" languages, especially if convinced that this would "benefit everyone". Personally, I haven't a clue what language "half of France and Spain" would choose to use as a lingua franca, but if the above estimation is anywhere near accurate, then there would seem to be a great opportunity out there for acting upon it and setting up an Esperanto forum. The world awaits you. Edited by daristani on 18 January 2010 at 1:43am 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||
| Gusutafu Senior Member Sweden Joined 5529 days ago 655 posts - 1039 votes Speaks: Swedish* | Message 182 of 351 17 January 2010 at 9:40pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
I think I guess what France would choose, and it's not Esperanto... If they prefer Esperanto to English (which I doubt) it would be precisely because the vocabulary is so heavily slanted towards the Romance languages, which is another sense in which Esperanto is not neutral. If you want a truly neutral language, you need some apolitical autists to man a randomiser to create words that are equally hard for all the word to remember. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||
| davidwelsh Heptaglot Senior Member Norway Joined 5537 days ago 141 posts - 307 votes Speaks: Lowland Scots, English*, Norwegian, Esperanto, Swedish, Danish, French Studies: Polish, Sanskrit, Tibetan, Pali, Mandarin | Message 183 of 351 17 January 2010 at 11:24pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
I commented on this a while back (Message 92). I think this discussion's perhaps tending towards being rather long and circular...
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| Gusutafu Senior Member Sweden Joined 5529 days ago 655 posts - 1039 votes Speaks: Swedish* | Message 184 of 351 18 January 2010 at 12:02am | IP Logged | ||||||||
Yes, but this is a pretty negative form of neutrality - being equally awkward for everyone - and if your Esperantist colleagues are right, it's not true. There are supposedly heaps of native Esperanto speakers, perhaps there are to be the next ruling class? Unless you believe that everyone will have Esperanto as their native tongue, the exact same situation as you describe with English will repeat itself with Esperanto. 2 persons have voted this message useful |
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