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From: lilandbr@scn.org (Leland Bryant Ross)
Subject: Re: Thoughts on IAL Success (long)
Message-ID: <DtA228.5wM@scn.org>
Sender: news@scn.org
Reply-To: lilandbr@scn.org (Leland Bryant Ross)
Organization: Seattle Community Network
References: <31C61851.18D8@gold.tc.umn.edu> <Pine.SOL.3.93.960516120216.18837B-100000@rask> <31b4147c.4200980@news.nando.net> <4p1sk3$ecq@netsrv2.spss.com> <4p2638$t2f@panix2.panix.com> <4p2dti$1hv@netsrv2.spss.com> <4p4lcd$io5@oravannahka.Helsinki.FI> <P
Date: Thu, 20 Jun 1996 02:39:43 GMT
Lines: 64

ine.SUN.3.93.960606102401.1643B-
Organization: Seattle Community Network

In a previous article, bunda002@gold.tc.umn.edu ("Karl M. Bunday") says:

>Edmund Grimley-Evans wrote, in reply to my earlier reply to him: 
>> Very roughly: >> 
>> 1 000 have Esperanto as a native language 
>> 10 000 speak it fluently [and well]   

!I think Edmund might agree with me that the degree of fluency and level of 
ability to adhere to normative grammatical rules that this figure 
presupposes before one is "counted" would, if applied to English, 
decrease the customarily cited figures by an order of magnitude! Leland

On the other hand, a number of the native Esperanto speakers are not (or 
are no longer) fluent, and some never did learn to speak it "fluently 
[and well]"!

 > >A recent return look at the soc.culture.esperanto newsgroup turned up 
many fewer >notes than I expected, which confirms the lower, rather than 
the higher, estimates >that I have heard. 

What does the popularity of soc.culture.esperanto newsgroup have to do
with the number of Esperanto users?  Many of us still depend largely on
print and handwriting!  As do lots of English users. > >I don't have any
disagreement with the idea that we can ALL do our part to >communicate
with more people. So I went from knowing "only" the world's second- (or
>perhaps third-) most-spoken language (which is unquestionably the
language most >spread around the world, and most in use as an
international auxiliary language) to >knowing also the most-spoken
language (which is somewhat restricted in its geographic >range) and
various smatterings of other languages. But the message that opened this
>subject referred mostly to constructed languages. 

I have every reason to
believe that >conlangs DETRACT from the task of getting more people
talking with one another.  
!Any Esperantist like me or Edmund who speaks Esperanto regularly knows 
this is a lie (or at best the height of misbelief)!
>In return he frequently has the >> opportunity to observe me
>speaking Esperanto on the phone ... > >
>To whom do you speak Esperanto on the phone? 

I don't know about Edmund, but I speak Esperanto on the phone roughly 
every other day, sometimes with local people, sometimes with visitors, 
sometimes long distance to California or wherever (I admit, I've never 
spoken Esperanto to or in Minnesota; nor Chinese).  Many of those with 
whom I use it are not native English speakers.



bunda002@gold.tc.umn.edu >74222.1721@compuserve.com cfmc77a@prodigy.com
>http://198.83.19.39/School_is_dead/Learn_in_freedom.html >"Tosauta ei
tychoi gene phonon eisin en kosmoi kai ouden aphonon; ean oun me eido ten
>dynamin tes phones, esomai toi lalounti barbaros kai ho lalon en emoi
barbaros.">
Greek to me!

--
Liland Brajant ROS'       "I don't care if my wheels are comin' off,
P O Box 30091                 long as I got my plastic Zamenhof...."
Seattle, WA 98103 Usono      USONA ANTOLOGIO Baptista Esperantistaro
Tel. (206) 633-2434                 English, especially under duress
