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From: iad@cogsci.ed.ac.uk (Ivan A Derzhanski)
Subject: Re: Esperanto as a stepping stone?
Message-ID: <D23yws.FBA@cogsci.ed.ac.uk>
Organization: Centre for Cognitive Science, Edinburgh, UK
References: <HCANNON.118.2F0F0796@macalstr.edu> <elnaD22xoI.Hwz@netcom.com>
Date: Sun, 8 Jan 1995 22:38:50 GMT
Lines: 66

In article <elnaD22xoI.Hwz@netcom.com> elna@netcom.com (Esperanto League N America) writes:
>Consider a Chinese person who wishes to learn a European language,
>say French or English. She is introduced to the concept of an alphabet,
>a collection of several dozen symbols which allegedly reflect the
>pronunciation of the words which make up the language. This is of course
>quite novel, because Chinese ideograms give no clue to the sound of the 
>word; the sound of each symbol must be memorized individually.

They usually do give a *clue*, but no more than that.  :-)

>But rather soon this correlation between spelling and pronunciation
>breaks down, what with "silent letters" and multiple potential
>transliterations of a given sound, etc. In short orthographic
>impurity of national languages causes confusion.

A few comments:

(1) In the beginning of this article French and English were chosen
as random examples of European languages.  Now suddenly all natural
languages are being accused of orthographic idiosyncrasy.  But this
generalisation is obviously false; English has beyond doubt the most
lunatic orthography in existence, with French coming a close second.
A Chinese student of any other European language would face a much
easier task.  In Finnish the correlation between letter and sound
is as high as it is in Esperanto.

(2) While I agree that it is a good idea for the student to be exposed
to the Roman script before taking up English or French, I believe that
reading and writing Mandarin in pin1yin1 is a much more straightforward
way for a Chinese speaker to get acquainted with it.  (I'm extrapolating
from my own experience.  My first exposure to the Roman script was via
romanised Bulgarian, and it worked quite well.  :-))

>Then there is the business of irregular plurals, exceptions
>to verb patterns, etc. all the way through the lovely eccentricities of the
>target language.  This all presents a fuzzy picture of the fundamental
>concepts which underlie most European languages.
>
>If the same Chinese student were to preface her study of French or English
>with a basic course in Esperanto, she would gain a simple, regular framework
>of the structure of European (dare I say Indo-European?) languages

No, you dare not, though `European' is incorrect also (for the purpose
of learning the structure of Basque, say, Esperanto is totally useless).

>which would function well as a skeleton on which to hang the flesh
>and fat of any national language from that family.

Er, how does the study of Esperanto make dealing with irregular
plurals easier?  Or with irregular conjugations?  (Btw, Spanish
has no irregular plurals either.)

>I submit that the best preparation for the successful study of any
>language is a happy and rewarding introduction to the study of languages.

No doubt about that.

>Esperanto provides this by its nature.

Now this is where we have to differ.

-- 
`Release Jesus wi this mob hangin aroon?  Nae chance!'  (The Glasgow Gospel)
Ivan A Derzhanski (iad@cogsci.ed.ac.uk, iad@chaos.cs.brandeis.edu)
* Centre for Cognitive Science,  2 Buccleuch Place,   Edinburgh EH8 9LW,  UK
* Cowan House E113, Pollock Halls, 18 Holyrood Pk Rd, Edinburgh EH16 5BD, UK
