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From: ddg@cci.com (D. Dale Gulledge)
Subject: Re: Concerning the number of esperantists
In-Reply-To: rmoldenhauer@doit.wisc.edu's message of 8 Aug 1996 16:13:29 GMT
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Date: Tue, 13 Aug 1996 21:05:26 GMT
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First, I apologize to the readers of any of these newsgroups who aren't
interested in this subject.  I would have trimmed the newgroups line, but I
don't know which newsgroup Mr. Moldenhauer is reading this in.  His comments,
though critical of Esperanto, are thoughtful and polite and deserve the same
sort of response.

In article <4ud3n9$s6f@tofu.alt.net> rmoldenhauer@doit.wisc.edu (Robert Moldenhauer) writes:

    But is Esperanto's solution of being hard for some and easy for 
   others 
    an equally undesirable situation?  Yes, the European Languages on 
    which it is based are heavy studied, but the point is you are just 
    exchanging one European vocabulary for another.  There is no real 
    gain.  

I think that you have misjudged Esperanto's vocabulary a bit.  The sources for
the roots are indeed European languages.  This does mean that it is easier for
people who are already familiar with the source languages to recognize the
vocabulary and achieve passing reading fluency.  However, Esperanto's
vocabulary, like its grammar, is designed to be easier to learn.  I'll give a
brief example:

  English             Esperanto

  to be               esti
  I am                mi estas
  you are             vi estas
  he is               li estas
  we are              ni estas
  I was               mi estis
  I will be           mi estos
  future              estonta (as an adjective, such as `future wife')
  present             estanta
  past                estinta
  the future          estonteco
  the present         estanteco
  the past            estinteco
  a being             estulo
  to attend           cxeesti

I am making three separate points here, two of which are fairly obvious from
the examples I've give:

1) An enormous variety of words are derived from a small set of roots.  This
   requires less memorization that a typical national language, such as
   English.
2) The derivation is regular.  The roots and affixes don't change their
   spelling or pronunciation depending on what they are attached to.  There
   are no irregular verbs, or even different conjugations.
3) The same prefixes and suffixes can be attached to any root, if the
   combination makes sense.  This point isn't obvious from the examples above,
   so let me elaborate a bit.  There is an Esperanto prefix ek- that, when
   attached to a verb indicates that the action has suddenly begun.  It can
   pretty much be attached to any verb.

  Esperanto           English

  vidi                to see
  ekvidi              to catch sight of
  krii                to cry
  ekkrii              to cry out (not a perfect translation)
  bruli               to burn
  ekbruli             to catch fire

The point here is that a new speaker of Esperanto can "invent" words as needed
from a small set of roots and affixes.  They are perfectly valid words and
they will be understood by most Esperantists.  Subtle shades of meaning
generally require some clarification, but just getting a basic point across is
not difficult.

- Dale
--
D. Dale Gulledge, Software Engineer
Directory & Operator Services, Nortel.
Rochester, NY

Warning: Bicyclist in mirror is moving faster than you think.
