Newsgroups: sci.lang,alt.politics.ec
From: philip@storcomp.demon.co.uk (Phil Hunt)
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Subject: Re: One point against Esperanto
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References: <3is8kg$rb@ilex.fernuni-hagen.de> <794020815snz@storcomp.demon.co.uk> <MRA.95Mar7235548@rhea.hut.fi>
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Date: Thu, 9 Mar 1995 16:19:46 +0000
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In article <MRA.95Mar7235548@rhea.hut.fi>
           mra@rhea.hut.fi "Marko Rauhamaa" writes:
> >I agree. Also in Esperanto there is no pronoun meaning person of
> >indeterminate gender (like writing "he/she" in English). If Esperanto
> >was adopted by the EU, I expect that that would be changed, to 
> >something like this:
> >
> >     patr-o      parent
> >     patr-iv-o   father
> >     patr-in-o   mother
> 
> This is one of the main topics of       Cxi tio estas unu cxefa temo de la
> the Internet Esperanto community at     Internet-a esperantkomunumo aktuale.
> this time.  If you know Esperanto,      Se vi povas legi esperanton, rigardu
> take a look at                          jenon:
> 
> gopher://gopher.cam.ac.uk/00/CambUniv/univsoc/esper/%23HTML%23%23%23_riismo%23

Since I posted that, I have been made aware of riismo.
 
> It proposes a solution to the           Gxi proponas solvon por la problemo.
> problem.  (However, I don't think       (Tamen mi ne kredas, ke se oni nomas
> calling father "patrivo" would make     patron "patrivo", tio sonigus la
> "patrino" sound any more feminine in    vorton "patrino" iom pli virineca en
> the ears of the speakers of the         la oreloj de la parolantoj de la
> Romance languages.)                     romidaj lingvoj.)

I agree. The solution which would do this would be to have 2 separate
roots "patr" and "matr". However an increase in the number of roots 
would make the lang harder to learn.
 
> it most in Esperanto).  The             gxin en esperanto).  La
> West-European culture and attitudes     okcidenteuxropa kulturo kaj pozoj
> have evolved quite a bit during the     ege evoluis dum la pasintaj kelkaj
> last few decades, so this feature of    jardekoj, do cxi tiu eco de
> Esperanto (and Spanish and German       esperanto (kaj la hispana kaj
> and French and...) is a cause of        germana kaj franca kaj...) kolerigas
> anger for some.                         kelkajn.

It's not surprising. When Zamenhof invented the -in suffix, it probably
just seemed natural to consider the male words as the root, and the
corresponding female word a deviation from that. But times have changed.
 
> I consider myself a feminist and        Mi taksas min feminismano kaj min
> strongly dislike expressions like       forte malplacxas esprimoj kiel
> "actress" or "engineeress".             "aktorino" aux "ingxenierino".

"actress" is OK, because a particular role in a film will usually 
*require* that the person playing it be male or female. I've never seen 
"engineeress" used and would consider it a silly usage.

> Nevertheless, I don't think this        Tamen mi ne kredas, ke cxi tiu eco
> feature of Esperanto causes             de esperanto estigas praktikajn
> practical problems; after all           problemojn; esperanto ja havas
> Esperanto does have a prefix that       prefikson, kiu seksneuxtraligas
> makes a word gender-neutral, "ge-":     vorton, "ge-": "gepatroj",
> "gepatroj" (parents), "gefratoj"        "gefratoj", "gekuzoj".  Komparu tion

Yes, but that is just a plural term and AFAIK it cannot be used in the
singular. So how would one say in E-o "Children must be accompanied by
a parent"? My Esperanto/English dictionary gives "origina" but that doesn't
use the "patr" root and in any case means "origin". It is an adjective 
so presumerably the corresponding noun would be "orininulo".

> (siblings), "gekuzoj" (cousins).        kun la franca aux la hispana, en
> Compare that with French or Spanish,    kiuj oni diras simple, ke oni uzas
> where they say bluntly that the         la viran formon, kiam ajn homgrupo
> masculine is used whenever a group      enhavas almenaux unu virulon.
> of people contains at least one
> male.

Yes French and Spanish are even worse here.
 
> And let me tell you: "patrino" is       Kaj mi diru al vi, ke "patrino" ne
> "mother" and not "she-father", just     estas "virina patro" gxuste kiel

Well, sure it *means* mother. But it is composed from roots meaning
"father" and "female". If that doesn't make it sexist language usage, I 
don't know what would. E-o uses the male form as the root, and constructs 
the female and males-and-females-together forms from this. A lot of people
disapprove of this sort of thing, and if the EU adopted Esperanto I expect
they would change it.

I am currently constructing a language "Eurolang" which uses non-sexist
words for people, eg:

     pater     "parent"
     paters    "parents"
     mal-pater "father"
     fem-pater "mother"

All words are neuter (only 2 exceptions "vir"(man) and "femino"(woman)).
Prefixes are used for making male or female forms, eg:

    canis       "dog"
    fem-canis   "bitch"
    mal-canis   "male dog"

This treats males and females the same.

> >While they're at it they could also abolish the -n accusative ending,
> >and adjective agreement using -j. And change some spellings to make it
> >easier to recognise words:
> >
> >   current   new
> >   -------   ---
> >   kv        qu
> >   k         c 
> >   ks        x
> >   s^        sh
> >
> >So:
> >    akvo "water" --> aquo
> >    ekskurso "excursion" --> excurso
> >    s^ipo "ship" --> shipo
> 
> Are you serious?  I can't tell.         Cxu vi sxercas?  Mi ne estas certa.

Yes.
 
> We already have English.  Why would     Ni jam havas la anglan.  Kial oni
> you want to make Esperanto English?     volus fari esperanton la angla?

Changing the spellings wouldn't change E-o into English; but it would
make the spelling more familiar to people who speak English (and French,
Spanish, Italian and Portuguese). Since this accounts for a large majority
of EU citizens, it would make E-o easier to learn by Europeans, thus
saving the EU money (which is one main reason for adopting a common lang.
in the first place).

> As for recognizability, compare the     Koncerne rekoneblecon, komparu
> following words in Finnish,             jenajn vortojn en la suoma,
> Esperanto and your renovated            esperanto kaj via novigita
> Esperanto:                              esperanto:
> 
>          kemia        kemio        cemio
>          kassa        kaso         caso         
>          kukko        koko         coco
>          korppi       korvo        corvo
>          marksismi    marksismo    marxismo
>          ekskursio    ekskurso     excurso
>          akvarelli    akvarelo     aquarelo
>          v            ^
>          sakki        sako         shako
>          v            ^
>          sovinisti    sovinisto    shovinisto

How many EU citizens speak Finnish compared to all the languages I've
listed above? Not many. What's better: convenience for the many, or
convenience for the few.

-- 
Phil Hunt...philip@storcomp.demon.co.uk
"on no pos fac omelet, opcum brekigation ovums"
