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Esperanto a waste of time? | ||
 Language Learning Forum : Esperanto |  | |
| Hoogamagoo Diglot Newbie United States Joined 6549 days ago 14 posts - 70 votes  Speaks: English*, Esperanto | Message 313 of 351 24 November 2010 at 1:58am | IP Logged | ||||||||
Heh. You just reminded me of my favorite Esperanto irregularity: "Mi amas vin'" That apostrophe makes a huge difference. Spoken, this phrase means "I love you," but when read it means both "I love wine" and/or "wine love me" Sweet poetry, eh? 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| GREGORG4000 Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 5521 days ago 307 posts - 479 votes Speaks: English*, Finnish Studies: Japanese, Korean, Amharic, French | Message 315 of 351 24 November 2010 at 2:25am | IP Logged | ||||||||
Interesting! I didn't know that Esperanto allowed for those types of abbreviations. Can you do that with verbs too, e.g. just saying "est" instead of "estas"? I guess that wouldn't work that well with the past and future though...
The people who are arguing against Esperanto "being a language" have their own definition of language, instead of using the scientific definition; it would be silly to argue against it being a language in a scientific context. I think what they mean is that it's not the "full package" of a language for them, in the same way that people don't think Latin or Hittite are "full packages". Edited by GREGORG4000 on 24 November 2010 at 2:28am 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| Hoogamagoo Diglot Newbie United States Joined 6549 days ago 14 posts - 70 votes Speaks: English*, Esperanto | Message 317 of 351 24 November 2010 at 2:43am | IP Logged | ||||||||
It's a poetic abuse, really. Also, there's a linguistic variation that young whippersnapper Esperantists sometimes use called "Esperant'" So, to answer your question, it's not really "allowed," unless you're quoting poetry or speaking in Esperant'. (Actually, as I recall in Esperant', you couldn't really get away with it because you'd have to say "Mi amas je vin'" which gives it away, but it's still suspicious sounding). Anyway, the poetry stuff lets us be free with our ambiguity, but not when we're being serious. I mean, technically when you say "mi amas vin'" you're missing not only the 'o' but also the 'n' at the end to make it an object. That's why it gets so absurdly ambiguous. Still, it's not going to stop somebody from drunkenly quoting a little poetry to "Miss Right Now," if you know what I mean. When the Esperanto sitcoms start being produced, you can bet a scenario based around this gag will be the first to play. Edited by Hoogamagoo on 24 November 2010 at 4:33am 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||
| Juаn Senior Member Colombia Joined 5343 days ago 727 posts - 1830 votes Speaks: Spanish* | Message 318 of 351 24 November 2010 at 3:48am | IP Logged | ||||||||
No it wasn't, and I've already explained it to you a number of times, so please make an effort to understand. It was about the distinction between how the general public and a community of connoisseurs engage in discussion about the latter's topics of interest. I could have used the example of fast food eaters and chefs, how some matter relating to food might be indifferent to the former but a contentious topic to the latter, and that this doesn't somehow mean that one is more or less illustrated or "tolerant" than the other. But then you'd be obsessing that the discussion is about food.
Seeing that you're given to technicalities, let's get some concepts straightened out. This is a community of language learners, not linguists. One doesn't need to be a linguist in order to learn a language, and a linguist can perfectly well remain monolingual. One studies languages as if dissecting an organism, looking for things such an universal grammar or ways to separate words into the simplest possible morphemes; the other lives and breathes the languages he or she is studying, immersing him or herself into the culture and society that gave birth to it. The comments I made about Esperanto were in relation to language learners, not linguists, and I quote:
The standard that makes a language worth considering for a language enthusiast is not the same as that by which a linguist defines one as such, and to the former was my comment addressed, not the latter. Hence to bring a linguistic standard into the discussion is completely beyond the point, as it doesn't apply to what is being argued about. That there is a means by which someone manages to communicate a message does not make it something worth learning to me, a language enthusiast and learner, and this is what I expressed, the opinion that for some language learners Esperanto cannot be regarded in the same category as "authentic" languages, seeing that it lacks the very qualities that make languages interesting: the imprint of history, culture and society. Coincidentally, I just finished reading an essay by Rabindranath Tagore about Bengali nursery rhymes and children stories. He maintains that these, in their spontaneous language, are the finest exponents of Bengali literature and the Bengali soul, that the natural, unmediated tenderness of a mother to her children captures and maintains alive the timeless spirit of the Bengali people. This is what one caresses when learning a foreign language, the soul of a people, and what Esperanto utterly lacks, having been born in a laboratory. Seeing that engaging in sterile debate is not conducive to what interests me about this forum, learning languages, I retire from this discussion. Have a nice time enjoying Esperanto. I'll do the same with my languages. 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||
| Aineko Triglot Senior Member New Zealand Joined 5446 days ago 238 posts - 442 votes Speaks: Serbian*, EnglishC2, Spanish Studies: Russian, Arabic (Written), Mandarin | Message 320 of 351 24 November 2010 at 4:27am | IP Logged | ||||||||
I always get confused when people say something like this. But Esperanto does have an imprint of history (100y or more), culture (the starting idea and development to what it is today) and society (quite a unique one - not geographically constrained). If everyone would call a language only what they find interesting, that would create very confusing situations. I, for example, care primarily for literature, the written word. Do I have right to say that every language without writing system is not a language? I don't care about ideas behind Esperanto nor for how long it's been around. I care for poems I've seen/hear in Esperanto (as I already said somewhere on this topic). I don't get how it can be less a language than any other language you can write poetry in. 5 persons have voted this message useful |
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