Newsgroups: sci.lang
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From: elna@netcom.com (Esperanto League N America)
Subject: Re: languages & happiness!!
Message-ID: <elnaE4unGL.HLn@netcom.com>
Organization: Esperanto League for North America, Inc.
References: <853605030.2652@dejanews.com> <32EF92B7.6BCC@sn.nono> <32f3b4ac.10604428@news.mindspring.com> <32EFC661.5953@sn.nono>
Date: Fri, 31 Jan 1997 01:43:33 GMT
Lines: 41
Sender: elna@netcom6.netcom.com

ablehr@sn.nono writes in a recent posting (reference <32EFC661.5953@sn.nono>):
>D Gary Grady wrote:
>> [Anders Blehr:]
>> >Maybe this will come as a surprise to you, but most people reading
>> >sci.lang *don't* consider it a "problem" that we have different
>> >languages, some even take pleasure in learning *several* languages. 
>> Alas, this is yet another straw-man argument: You seem to be arguing
>> against a position no one has taken.
>Well, I responded to Esperanto League N America who was using the term
>*language problems*.  Had he used "communication problems" instead, I
>would have said nothing.  It seems that Esperantists often confuse
>language and communication.
>
I apologise for using a layman's term perhaps too loosely. I meant 
"Language problem" rather as one would use "Transportation problem"
so that the issue is not that language (or transportation) *is* the
problem, but is the field or arena of a set of problems.

There are quite a few real problems which are worthy of serious study
by sociolinguists; some of them are even solvable by widespread 
education in Esperanto:

1. Tourists' inability to communicate with locals.
2. Communication within transnational corporations.
3. United Nations' & European Union's huge budget for interpretation and
translation.
4. Availability of literature not-yet-widely translated.
5. Subtitles of foreign films. 
6. Bad attitude toward language-learning brought on by complexity of 
national languages and subsequent frustration.
7. Etc.

While some folks who read sci.lang do not even acknowledge that these
problems exist, there are many who find them worthy of discussion.


-- 
Miko SLOPER              elna@netcom.com              USA  (510) 653 0998
Direktoro de la          ftp.netcom.com:/pub/el/elna   fax (510) 653 1468 
Centra Oficejo de la     Learn Esperanto! Free lessons: e-mail/snail-mail
Esperanto-Ligo de N.A.   Write to above address or call:  1-800-ESPERANTO
