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Esperanto: some questions. | ||
Tags: Esperanto | ||
 Language Learning Forum : Esperanto |  | |
| ldgc27 Diglot Newbie United States Joined 5929 days ago 9 posts - 9 votes Speaks: Spanish*, English Studies: German | Message 1 of 6 29 October 2008 at 1:03pm | IP Logged | ||
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Hi,
I have read that one can learn Esperanto in a few months if not weeks. Is this fact true for anyone here? If yes, what are the best materials to learn it? I have a book already: A Complete Grammar Of Esperanto by Ivy Kellerman. However, I cannot read it right now until I have some time free. How much time should I dedicate to this language on a daily basis: 1 hour or 30 minutes is enough? I was also wondering if learning Esperanto will help you learn other languages faster? I now this also depends on your motivation, dedication... Anyway, I read that fact here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Esperanto#Language_acquisition Edited by ldgc27 on 29 October 2008 at 1:05pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
 jeff_lindqvist Diglot Moderator SwedenRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 6913 days ago 4250 posts - 5711 votes  Speaks: Swedish*, English Studies: German, Spanish, Russian, Dutch, Mandarin, Esperanto, Irish, French Personal Language Map | Message 2 of 6 29 October 2008 at 5:41pm | IP Logged | ||
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There is a thread called Advanced fluency on Esperanto that is related to your first question.
As for your second question, I can't say. I for one like "cross-training" (music instruments, martial arts and much more), but am also aware that time is probably best spent on what I want to learn, not something else. I have seen some "evidence" that some Esperanto-learning students made faster progress in French than those who only spent time on French. But who knows. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| ennime Tetraglot Senior Member South Africa universityofbrokengl Joined 5908 days ago 397 posts - 507 votes Speaks: English, Dutch*, Esperanto, Afrikaans Studies: Xhosa, French, Korean, Portuguese, Zulu | Message 3 of 6 29 October 2008 at 11:40pm | IP Logged | ||
If you read this carefully you'll notice that the study is specifically about Esperanto being the first second language before learning any other. It basically takes away the difficulty of having to learn a language for the first time I guess, as first ones are more difficult than if you have already experience etc. So yes and no... I learned Esperanto grammar within a month, but it doesn't give me an edge in other languages... 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Sprachprofi Nonaglot Senior Member Germany learnlangs.comRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 6474 days ago 2608 posts - 4866 votes Speaks: German*, English, French, Esperanto, Greek, Mandarin, Latin, Dutch, Italian Studies: Spanish, Arabic (Written), Swahili, Indonesian, Japanese, Modern Hebrew, Portuguese | Message 4 of 6 30 October 2008 at 8:21am | IP Logged | ||
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It is definitely easier to start with a completely regular language as your first foreign language, and if you have already learned another (European) foreign language, learning Esperanto grammar will not help you much more. However, Esperanto vocabulary can still help you and I also find that Esperanto's free expression and the word-building system helps me relate to non-European languages.
For example, in Chinese they say "wo3 e4", which can be accurately rendered in Esperanto as "mi malsatas", whereas English would have you say "I am hungry" and German "Ich habe Hunger" (I have hunger). However, in Esperanto you could imitate English too and say "mi estas malsata". Similarly, it can be a help for relating to the full meaning of new vocabulary, for example in Arabic I encountered the word "maktab", derived from "kataba"(to write) - yes, Arabic derivation rules are crazy. "maktab" can mean "desk" or "office", but neither of these suggest "to write" in English... Esperanto's "skrib-ej-o" not just covers both the meaning "desk" and "office", it also shows the relation to "skribi"(to write). Yes it's possible to come by all that on your own, but to me, Esperanto just makes these words a lot more logical. As for learning materials for self-study: I believe that Lernu has the best and printed courses have often drawn bad critiques in this forum. You could do "Ana Pana" followed by "Ana Renkontas" for example, and then move on to real-life materials. Edited by Sprachprofi on 30 October 2008 at 8:24am 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| ldgc27 Diglot Newbie United States Joined 5929 days ago 9 posts - 9 votes Speaks: Spanish*, English Studies: German | Message 5 of 6 30 October 2008 at 10:37am | IP Logged | ||
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Thank you all for the replies, the advice and the interesting information. Edited by ldgc27 on 30 October 2008 at 10:38am 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Emerald Triglot Senior Member United Kingdom languagedabbler.blog Joined 6249 days ago 316 posts - 340 votes Speaks: Hindi, Gujarati*, English Studies: Spanish | Message 6 of 6 30 October 2008 at 1:41pm | IP Logged | ||
I like Lernu courses too. I think it's good material to start off with. I have completed Bildoj Kaj Demandoj, because I thought it would be good introduction to do a course with only using Esperanto, and it has worked for me. Now I am going through Ana Pana, and after that I will do Ana Renkontas. Lernu's free tutor system is quite useful too, because then you know if you did something wrong. 1 person has voted this message useful |
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