Do All Journalists Speak Esperanto Now? (Esperanto) Language Learning Forum

Do All Journalists Speak Esperanto Now?
Tags: Esperanto
Language Learning Forum : Esperanto

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cordelia0507
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United Kingdom
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Studies: German, Russian

Message 17 of 45

02 August 2009 at 2:10pm | IP Logged

Cainntear wrote:

wouldn't it be better to all learn a newer, more neutral and more scientific conlang that would be easier to "sell" to the world at large?

Perhaps your observation about the sociology / anthropology, or what not, of the Esperanto movement is right...

But Esperanto is still significantly easiser than any existing European language though. And it's got some degree of momentum.

But which other conlang do you think would better serve the idea of a "neutral world-wide" lingua franca?

It's also occurred to me, that it may not be possible to invent a language that is equally 'fair' to all languages. Perhaps it makes more sense to have a few regional ones, complemented by a world conlang?

Learning an Asian conlang is surely easier than learning a real Asian language!

Personally I'd be happy if Esperanto took off in Europe for the time being. It would be great for business, education and regular people the continent. Hopefully it would stop the crazy and embarrassing translation circus in Brussels and elsewhere. (It's expensive and sends a very negative message to regular Europeans).

It might be that another conlang can be created for Asia that is more "Asian" in characteristics. Emergence of Esperanto in Europe would probably inspire someone in Asia to become the Asian Zamenhof and someone in Africa to do the same for that continent, if people there are interested. Etc.

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EDIT -- I am such a novice in this field. While I wrote my comment, Sprachprofi wrote hers, much better informed. I'll leave mine in though.

Edited by cordelia0507 on 02 August 2009 at 2:25pm
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TheElvenLord
Diglot
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United Kingdom
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1 sounds
Speaks: Cornish, English*
Studies: Spanish, French, German
Studies: Portuguese, Mandarin

Message 19 of 45

02 August 2009 at 6:00pm | IP Logged

Sorry to take us back a bit, but I tried sending a PM to you Sprachprofi but it cannot send due to you having a full inbox.

I was wandering if you could expand on how Tolstoy learned esperanto by reading?

Also, I would be very interested in attending your seminar on the 9th, but I will be in Germany at the time and therefore not able to attend. However, would it be possible for you to record the lecture, and then send me the audio? I would be very grateful.

Thank you

TEL
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eoinda
Tetraglot
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Sweden
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Speaks: Swedish*, English, Spanish, Mandarin
Studies: French

Message 20 of 45

02 August 2009 at 9:13pm | IP Logged

I kind of like the idea of esperanto (or another conlag)as the world language, as long as
it doesn't mean making all other languages extinct and only going with esperanto
(shockingly I've actually heard people proposing this). The reason I've never studied
esperanto and doubt I ever will is that there are so many other languages with a long
history, loads of classical literature and rich cultures. I'm not claiming to know
anything
about esperanto but even thought it seems to be a nice society I don't think it can
measure up to that just yet.

Edited by eoinda on 02 August 2009 at 9:13pm
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cordelia0507
Senior Member
United Kingdom
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Studies: German, Russian

Message 21 of 45

02 August 2009 at 9:38pm | IP Logged

Can I ask something: How common is it for people to speak Esperanto but not English?

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icing_death
Senior Member
United States
Joined 5865 days ago
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Speaks: English*

Message 22 of 45

02 August 2009 at 10:02pm | IP Logged

I'm all for learning Esperanto, but would never consider promoting it. I don't promote any of my other languages,
so why treat it differently?
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cordelia0507
Senior Member
United Kingdom
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Speaks: Swedish*
Studies: German, Russian

Message 23 of 45

02 August 2009 at 10:17pm | IP Logged

OMG, according to some sources online the US and UK are ACTIVELY working AGAINST Esperanto because usage of English as a world language makes enormous sums for these countries every year.

An example:
Swedish wikipedia says that the role of English as the primary working language in the EU brings in 17 billions a year for the British government (could be 170 billion because of the confusing "miljard/biljon" usage in Sweden.)

I support the UK of course, but this seems immoral somehow.

The EU is only ONE organisation of millions if you include corporations, academics etc etc ad infinitum..

An attempt to make Esperanto the language of the UN was stopped by the US.

ENGLISH AS THE WORLD LANGUAGE IS BIG BUSINESS!

This is like is the copyright / net neutrality or closed code vs open source debate.

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Kugel
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United States
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Speaks: English*

Message 24 of 45

02 August 2009 at 10:25pm | IP Logged

Marc Frisch wrote:

The question "Why Esperanto?" has been debated thousand of times, no use of repeating the same old arguments over and over again; I think the positions are fairly clear.

What's more interesting is the question "Why Esperanto and not another conlang?" is much more interesting. As paranday said there exist many other conlangs which are "better" than Esperanto in the sense that they are less eurocentric, more logical (why the accusative ending -n???), etc. But I think that's not really the point. Esperanto is the conlang that has established international networks; it's by a large margin the most spoken conlang and simply has proved that it works as a tool of communication. It's the only viable option for a conlang to actually succeed as an IAL and I really believe that anyone who believes in the idea of an IAL should support Esperanto in order to create enough momentum for it to succeed.

Another important question is "Why now?". The linguistic situation in the world is rapidly shifting at this very moment. English is losing ground rapidly, as languages like Chinese, Arabic, and Spanish are becoming more important in international affairs. There's no doubt that English will keep its status as the language of business for quite some time, but as the world becomes more and more interconnected thanks to the internet and population and economic growth in the developing countries (according to "The Economist" the BRIC countries Brazil, Russia, India, and China will contribute 75% to global economic growth in the years to come), an easy tool to communicate becomes more desirable. Also, the European Union has become some sort of a new Babel with its 20-some official languages and desperately needs something like an IAL to evolve (I strongly disagree with the idea that English will become the lingua franca of Europe, there are just too many strong nationalist sentiments against it, e.g. in France, Italy and Spain.)

Last but not least, Esperanto is one of the languages that has benefited the most from the new media. It's very present in the internet and there is a vast amount of free learning resources of high quality available. When has it ever been so simple to learn Esperanto?

Economically, there doesn't seem to be a need for an IAL, as the Chinese, Indian, and U.S. economies hold an overwhelming piece of the economic pie, gaining more ground every year. One would be hard pressed to find an IAL that fulfills the needs of all three of these languages. India has already been using English as the lingua franca, so why should they adopt another one?

Esperanto I think has its place in continental Europe or in the offices of language hobbyists, which by the way, isn't a negative thing. I'm particularly interested in Interlingua, as I think it's a more natural way to build upon the currently existing languages. Arbitrary inventions, rebuilding a language from scratch, to place on society could be called hubris. I don't know.

Modern Hebrew, which I think is the best example of an imposed successful language, had deep literary roots before becoming a language of a nation. What does Esperanto have? Interlingua has the necessary roots, namely Latin...right?

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