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From: Nick Rezmerski <rezm0001@gold.tc.umn.edu>
Subject: Re: Esperanto (was: Languages in the EC)
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Date: Mon, 27 Feb 1995 04:22:22 GMT
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Ah, good to see somebody is listening out there.  What do we have here?

markrose@spss.com (Mark Rosenfelder) wrote:
>
> The current debate over Esperanto is at root a religious controversy.  

The "True Believers(tm)" vs. the "Doubting Thomases."  I can see similarities
to the style of debate, but of course the idea that Esperanto is a religion
are nonsense.  I'm an enthusiast, yet I don't attend the mass gatherings.

> As in most religious controversies, the rhetorical advantage generally lies
> with the believers, who know their facts better, are experienced debating
> the issue, and can have great fun demolishing the misconceptions and 
> prejudices that are thrown at them.

Yes, it's a shame that there *are* so many misconceptions and prejudices.

> And as in most religious controversies, the believers fail to convince most
> of the onlookers; partly because their arguments are too tied to the 
> acceptance of their beliefs, and appeal only to the converted; and partly
> because they cannot hold themselves back from insulting their opponents,
> which leaves a bad impression.

I hope I haven't insulted anyone!  That's not my intention.  And as for the
arguments, I have yet to see even one that wasn't based on some kind of
presumption.  That's okay, since the questions involved are mostly empirical.
They'll be answered one way or the other eventually.

> In the case of Esperanto, the basic problem is that the language has been
> around for a century, hasn't achieved even 1% of its goal, and cannot show
> that it ever will.  An Esperantist cannot admit this, even to himself... 
> without ceasing to be an Esperantist.  

I can admit this.  "Esperanto hasn't achieved even 1% of its goal, and cannot
show that it ever will."  Hmm, funny, I'm still an Esperantist (I can still
speak some Esperanto, I still think it's worth teaching to others...)

I think continual (but not constant) growth is a pretty good sign of the language
being capable of reaching its goal.  After all, Zamenhof (although he did have
higher hopes for this growth than were realistic) never said, "Okay, let's give
it a hundred years and that's it.  If there's anybody who still doesn't speak it
by then, it's obviously not going to work."  My point is that it does work for what
it was intended to do, and there's no reason to think it will stop working.

> In the course of doing some research on Esperanto, I read a long controversy
> on Esperanto, very similar to the current one, in the letter column of the
> _New York Times_... for 1910.  I don't think I've seen any arguments in this
> newsgroup, for or against, which weren't echoed in that discussion, 85 years
> ago.  (The case for Latin was presented a bit stronger then.  One letter-
> writer, who signed himself Arcadius Avellanus, maintained that Latin should
> replace the "degenerate" modern Romance languages.  And there were some real
> live supporters of Ido as well.  Talk about a no-win situation: any
> Esperanto-Ido argument, no matter who argues better, cannot fail to reduce
> an outsider's respect for both sides.)
> 
> This should tell the Esperantists something (but it won't).  For Esperanto
> to succeed, either something in the world has to change (and they'd better
> figure out what, before wasting another century); or something in the
> Esperanto movement has to change.  If Esperantists really wanted success,
> they should admit to themselves that the movement has been a failure, and
> seriously ask themselves why.  
> 
> "Failure" may seem too strong; but I'm only applying the Esperantists' own
> standards.  They want to convert the world, and they haven't.  If their
> goals were instead simply to promote international study, travel, and
> communication among those interested-- kind of like the youth hostel
> movement-- then Esperanto is a resounding success.

Again, it's working fine.  Slowly, but surely.  It hasn't failed, at least not
in the way that Volapuke failed.  Most of the people I've talked to have never
even *heard* of the language, which to me, is it's main failure.  Name recognition
is the bare minimum promotional goal.  On the other hand, most of the people I've
told about it (even if they had no use for it) thought it was a great idea.

> They might begin by examining whether some of their assumptions are 
> actually true.  For instance...
> 
> In article <D403LK.8r8@news.cis.umn.edu>,
> Nick Rezmerski  <rezm0001@gold.tc.umn.edu> wrote:
> >> (2) Economic: A common language would help create a unified European
> >> labor market.  It would reduce the cost of cross-border commerce.
> >
> >Agreed.  Trade and tourism could only benefit.
> 
> Really?  In fact, aren't people pretty good at knowing what's in their own
> economic interest?  If learning another language is necessary to get a job
> or sell products, people will do it (OK, in the latter case they'll hire
> someone else to do it for them).  

Keep this point in mind when you argue below against English's popularity being
based on British imperialism and American economic might.

> As for travel, according to all the evidence, people travel when they have
> the money to do so, not when they know other languages.  And if enough of
> them are travelling, the countries visited will find it in their interest to
> learn the travelers' languages.  
> 
> If after all that the Esperantists still want to maintain that "trade and
> tourism could only benefit", let them quantify exactly how much they would
> benefit-- and justify their answers.

I agree that shared language is far from being the only factor.  You can't simply
go anywhere just because you know the language.  On the other hand, tourists would
certainly like to have more options open to them, and I'm sure local merchants
would prefer to serve visitors from a wider geographical dispersion.  How could
I possibly quantify it?  It does seem obvious to me, though, that using just one
language wherever you go could hardly *decrease* trade and tourism.

> >> (3) Social:  A common language could promote a sense of shared
> >> identity among EU citizens, encouraging continued support for the
> >> Union.
> >
> >Agreed.  Linguistic barriers only fuel nationalism.
> 
> This is sacred Zamenhofiana and unlikely to be touched-- but it doesn't
> stand up to a moment's examination.  It's easy to see how Zamenhof, a Polish
> Jew, could have felt this way.  But many Russian Jews speak perfect Russian,
> and still face persecution.  Common languages never prevented competing 
> nationalisms in Northern Ireland, in Korea, in Bosnia, in Lebanon, in China.
> Where language seems to divide people, it's generally only because some
> other division (class, religion, race, national origin) is taking advantage 
> of it to do so.  Arguments over language in Canada, for instance, are not 
> really about language, but over anglophones' past treatment of francophones.
> 
> In fact I think the argument should be reversed: notions that a common
> language are needed for a "sense of shared identity" *are* nationalism.

"The babel fish, in effectively eliminating all barriers to communication, has
caused more and bloodier wars than anything in history."  Zamenhof's nightmare.
If you were to provide an argument that linguistic barriers somehow *encourage*
people to get along, I might see some value in it.  I still think the advantage
of being able to communicate directly is head and tails over the alternative.

> >> (4) Cultural: A common language would create a large audience for EU
> >> filmmakers, and television producers, improving their ability to
> >> compete with their American counterparts.
> >
> >And provide a good reason for Americans to learn the EC language!
> 
> This obviously hasn't been thought through very well.  This "large audience"
> wouldn't exist for many years; meanwhile, either the European film industry
> dwindles away until there's nothing worth saving, or it learns to compete
> using its current languages but with better strategies and advertising.

This is all hypothetical, so it doesn't matter much.  Personally, I think there
won't be a market for EC-language material until one language is actually *chosen*
as the EC standard.  No matter what it ends up being, it's probably not too likely
that Americans or other non-EC citizens will bother to learn it just for the purpose
of seeing this material.  Of course, if it were English or Esperanto, I'd be able to
take advantage of that!  Question is, would Title Wave stock it?

> >Also, my Esperanto dictionary doesn't seem to be lacking in words for most
> >of the scientific and technical terms I could think of.
> 
> One could scarcely conceive of a more inadequate test.  My French dictionary
> "doesn't seem to be lacking" in technical words either-- but it is, as I
> find when I actually try to use French for technical discussions (of 
> linguistics, computers, or statistics, for example).  

You're probably right, here.  I was speaking from personal experience and for my
own personal usage, the dictionary is more than adequate for these topics.  However,
you can pick another test - Esperanto's scientific vocabulary still meets the task.

> >> (B) Ease of introduction: Any common, neutral language will require
> >> enormous resources to train teachers, print materials, and so on to
> >> create a base of speakers in the EU.  The costs of such investment
> >> would likely outweigh the economic benefits of a common language for
> >> many years (point 2).  Supporters of Esperanto point out that they
> >> already have many speakers, learning materials and the like, while its
> >> detractors note that the number of speakers is still tiny.  [...]
> >
> >"It's pointless trying to increase the number of Esperanto speakers
> >because there aren't very many current speakers."  Right. Heard it.
> 
> And there, in a nutshell, is why the number of Esperanto speakers *won't*
> increase: Esperantists are familiar with the basic problem, even bored
> by it, as Mr. Rezmerski evidently and understandably is; but they have no
> answer for it.  Folks, you've been in the same boat for a hundred years.
> Why is 1995 different from 1965, and 1945, and 1925, and 1905?

The numbers *are* increasing - this is a point that others have shown.  And
And yes, I'm familiar with that attitude.  The answer I give is that this point
of view is a Catch-22.  The boat is no different from a perspective of trying to
increase the number of speakers; if you insist on using this paradox to justify
not learning the language, you're committing a fallacy.  The only way to get
out of the trap is by brute force - increase the number of speakers by *1*.

Although I try to convince people that the language can be useful, I don't
continue to proselytize to those who have no interest.  This is only harmful
to the movement, as you have very clearly pointed out.

> >The announcement of Esperanto's selection as an officially supported,
> >neutral European language would cause that market to mushroom.
> 
> This is nothing more than a statement of faith.  Symbolic gestures are nice,
> but don't in themselves accomplish much.  A few years ago, Quechua was made
> an official language in Peru.  I applaud this-- but I'd be fooling myself
> to think that it's made much practical difference.  
> 
> Instead of relying on acts of God or the EU, Esperantists would do better
> to study the economic, political, and sociolinguistic reasons why languages
> grow and decay-- and apply them objectively to their own language, not 
> just everybody else's.

It's true, I probably have too much faith in that this would be the effect of
such a decision by the EU.  On the other hand, Zamenhof realized that this is
exactly the sort of official endorsement Esperanto could not afford to wait for.
He envisioned and implemented it as a grassroots movement, which it still is.

> >Although I'm not a EU citizen, I think it's important to pick a
> >language that people can all learn to speak equally well.  
> 
> This is called "stacking the deck".  Esperanto is certainly easy to learn;
> naturally an Esperantist will push ease of learning as the chief criterion
> for an interlanguage.  Esperanto has very few speakers; naturally an
> Esperantist will pooh-pooh the advantages (number of speakers, number of
> teachers, rich lexicon, rich culture) of any widely spoken language.

> A similar tactic is to point out that Esperanto does not give any national
> group an "unfair advantage", as English is said to do.  Does anyone besides
> the Esperantists really believe that it would be a disadvantage, rather than
> an advantage, for a proposed common EU language to have a lot of speakers
> already?  

No, no!  In fact, these are the best reasons for choosing a natural language.
The question is, will they be able to settle on one without giving the native
speakers that advantage?  I've read a number of postings to the effect that
that English already is or should be the chosen language.  Does anyone seriously
doubt that many EC-member nations and peoples would resent this?

> >People have to have a reason for learning a language; in the case of English,
> >it's traditionally because non-English-speakers want American dollars.
> 
> >Part of the advantage of Esperanto is that there is an established
> >community of speakers who use it not out of necessity, but because
> >they WANT to establish international relationships, and are therefore
> >willing to take a step to meet others halfway, by learning Esperanto.
> 
> And here's where we get into the insults.  People who learn Esperanto are
> altruistic internationalists; while all you people who've learned English
> are just a bunch of greedheads.  
> 
> The statement itself is dubious enough (I do hope Ivan Derzhanski comments
> on the suggestion that he learned English out of a desire for American
> dollars); but that's not the point.  Try to ask yourselves, Esperantists:
> is this really the kind of argument that convinces people of your cause?

Hmm, I'm sorry if you or anyone else found that insulting.  On the other hand,
I *do* think it's true that English has the international status it has because
of money and political/military strength.  Sorry, but the truth can hurt.
This is not to say individuals don't have good, legitimate, non-monetary
reasons for learning English (or any other language).

I would have no problem with learning another person's language to foster
communication; I enjoy learning languages.  On the other hand, I would like
to reduce the amount of work involved and pick a neutral bridge!

> >My impression from watching debate over Esperanto has been this:
> >if people spent as much time learning some Esperanto as they do
> >arguing against it, they would see the advantage immediately.  Why
> >are people so afraid of trying it?  It's not difficult; it's fun!
> >You can always give it up and try something else later if you want.
> >It can't hurt, and it certainly CAN help.  It also just might make
> >you realize how tightly you tend to grip your mother tongue.
> 
> And the final religious appeal: you'd stop criticizing us if only you'd
> come join us.  Join us... join us...
> 
> What Mr. Rezmerski forgets is that religions have apostates, too.  
> I and others who've criticized Esperanto here-- I hope Scott Horne doesn't
> mind if I mention his name-- *have* taken the time to learn Esperanto.
> I'm not afraid of it, and if it *could* succeed I'd have no objection.
> But I became convinced that it's not going anywhere, and has no prospects
> for change.  And though yes, it was fun, I've gotten a lot more fun out of 
> French, Spanish, and Portuguese.
> 
> One final note: to the non-Esperantists: you're not going to win the 
> debate; religious arguments are not settled by rational discussion.
> To the Esperantists: I'm sorry if my arguments have been annoying.
> I have high respect for some of you, particularly Don Harlow, and I
> hope you continue doing your thing.  

Hmm.  Sorry you had that experience!  Of course, if you view Esperanto as
a religion instead of a language, the zeal of the followers could be
frightening.  I can't really say, since I haven't actually met any yet.

I do have to thank you, though, Mark, for pointing out that I sound like
one.  Realize, though, that by committing myself to something that I see
as valuable, I have to rationalize it somehow!  Rest assured, though, I
don't really take it *that* seriously, and I have no illusions that it
will become the "world's second language" in my lifetime.  I can hope,
though, can't I?

And yeah, Don's pretty cool, isn't he?  He's helped me a lot, although he
might not know it.  I'll go back to lurking soc.culture.esperanto now!

  - Nick@Nite (Nikolaso on irc/#esperanto)
    rezm0001@gold.tc.umn.edu
    Opinons are mine, not those of the University of Minnesota
    (So don't tell them what I said!)
