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From: iad@cogsci.ed.ac.uk (Ivan A Derzhanski)
Subject: Re: One point against Esperanto
Message-ID: <D574LH.BG@cogsci.ed.ac.uk>
Organization: Centre for Cognitive Science, Edinburgh, UK
References: <3is8kg$rb@ilex.fernuni-hagen.de> <794020815snz@storcomp.demon.co.uk> <MRA.95Mar7235548@rhea.hut.fi>
Distribution: inet
Date: Thu, 9 Mar 1995 23:15:16 GMT
Lines: 50

In article <MRA.95Mar7235548@rhea.hut.fi> mra@rhea.hut.fi (Marko Rauhamaa) writes:
>(However, I don't think calling father "patrivo" would make
>"patrino" sound any more feminine in the ears of the speakers
>of the Romance languages.)

We'll have to save this for a while.

>The origin of the feminine suffix "-in-" is obviously the German
>language, in which the "-in" ending is used maybe more frequently
>than in modern Esperanto [...].

It's not just German.  What does _-in-_ mean in Latin _reg-in-a_ `queen'
(cf. _rex_ < *_reg-s_ `king')?  How about the scores, if not hundreds,
of women's names ending in _-ina_ or _-ine_ (depending on the language)?

>And let me tell you: "patrino" is "mother" and not "she-father",

Now let's look at the paragraph we saved.  There you conceded that
_patrino_ may sound unfeminine to Romance speakers.  You are right;
I'm sure I'm not the only one to whom it sounds unfeminine.  (And it's
not just the Romance languages; _pater_ has close-sounding cognates in
several other branches of the Indo-European family.)  So, assuming
that the words for `father' and `mother' must be formed from the
same root, _patr-_ is a very poor choice: those who recognise it
are likely to reject it, and those who don't would be just as happy
with an _a priori_ root.

Other such unfeminine words are _knabino_ `girl' and _virino_ `woman'.

Given that Schleyer had it all worked out so well, it's a great pity
Zamenhof took such a huge step backwards.  (In Volapu"k sex-neutral
words are indeed sex-neutral, and they sound that way, too, not being
derived from sex-marked words of the source languages.)

>just like "malbona" is "bad" and not "the-other-way-good".

You mean `ungood'.  And then there's `unright' for `left'.

[re making the Esperanto orthography more naturalistic]
>We already have English.  Why would you want to make Esperanto English?

There's no shortage of derivatives of Esperanto with naturalistic
orthographies, not to mention all the naturalistic projects.  Why
reform Esperanto in that way when Interlingua is available?

-- 
`"Na, na ... ah mean, *no wey*, wi aw due respect, ma lady," stammers Joe.'
Ivan A Derzhanski (iad@cogsci.ed.ac.uk)    (J Stuart, _Auld Testament Tales_)
* Centre for Cognitive Science,  2 Buccleuch Place,   Edinburgh EH8 9LW,  UK
* Cowan House E113, Pollock Halls, 18 Holyrood Pk Rd, Edinburgh EH16 5BD, UK
