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From: dik@cwi.nl (Dik T. Winter)
Subject: Re: One point against Esperanto
Message-ID: <D4y7Jv.C7M@cwi.nl>
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Organization: CWI, Amsterdam
References: <D4wsoy.7y3@indirect.com>
Date: Sun, 5 Mar 1995 03:40:43 GMT
Lines: 49

In article <D4wsoy.7y3@indirect.com> stevemac@bud.indirect.com (Stefano MacGregor) writes:
 > > Example:
 > >   Esperanto:     vasta
 > >   Inflected:     vastajn     (Plural+Object)
 > >   English:       vast
 > >
 > >"vasta" looks a lot like "vast". "vastajn" looks less like "vast".
 > 
 >   This is a good example of your objection, and also of my reply.  A 
 > non-Esperantist sees the entire inflected word, and doesn't recognize 
 > it.  You see this as a bad thing; I see it as irrelevant.

This touches on my main objections against Esperanto, especially when
teaching it to young children.  The regulatiry of the languages makes
it an ideal tool to teach to elder people who have an inclination to
learn it.  There is less to memorize.  For the younger it is a bit
different.  When I was 13 I started with Esperanto, but dropped it for
a few reasons.  One of those was that I did not enjoy learning it.  This
may be strange, but at that age I enjoyed the irregular French verbs,
seeing what variation was possible.  Also learning the different
declinations and conjugations of Latin, and the irregularities, gave
more substance to the language than the dead-looking complete regularity
of Esperanto.  I am past the age to acquire fluency in any new language,
but still like to look at grammars, and see what is happening.  Especially
the irregularities; they make the spice of the language.

About young children.  They do not work with rules.  Nor with complete
memorization.  It is (I think) mostly by intuition.  I readily believe
(from another thread) that whatever the native language, the child will
acquire it about equally fast.  The conclusion from this is that there is
no difference when you teach young children a foreign language whether
that is Esperanto, English, Mandarin or whatever.  The advantages of
Esperanto will only become appararent when teaching to the elder.

 >                                                            Someone who 
 > has actually studied Esperanto for a few hours begins to see the parts 
 > that the words are constructed from -- in this case vast/a/j/n, and 
 > recognizes that the root of the word, 'vast-', is the only part that he 
 > should attempt to recognize in other languages.

(And again that attempt at recognition in other languages, which does
not apply for young children.)  Here again, there is some arbitrary
rule which young children will not recognize if their native language
does not have a similar rule.  So it does not help them.  And, heck,
my 12 year old daughter did not even study English for a few hours.
She just took it as an interesting game.
-- 
dik t. winter, cwi, kruislaan 413, 1098 sj  amsterdam, nederland, +31205924098
home: bovenover 215, 1025 jn  amsterdam, nederland; e-mail: dik@cwi.nl
