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From: Peter Hullah <Peter.Hullah@eurocontrol.fr>
Subject: Re: What is a native language? was Re: Rubbish Speak
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Date: Mon, 26 Feb 1996 09:39:42 GMT
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Mark Rosenfelder wrote:
> 
> In article <4gldur$j2j@larry.rice.edu>,
> Tamara Leigh Knox <tknox@owlnet.rice.edu> wrote:
> >In article <4gigg0$qqk@netsrv2.spss.com>, markrose@spss.com (Mark Rosenfelder) writes:
> >|> Studies of bilingualism suggest that children learn the languages they
> >|> need to get by... and no more.  Once a child figures out that his parents
> >|> understand English, he may well speak only English-- if his parents let
> >|> him.  Having to interact with people who speak only the home language
> >|> (e.g. grandparents) is generally enough to ensure that the home language
> >|> is actively spoken.
> >
> >All right, listen.  I'll buy that there are native Esperanto speakers.
> >I will not, however, believe that there are any people alive today
> >whose grandparents speak exclusively Esperanto ;)
> 
> My post didn't mention the word Esperanto, so I'm not sure who is asking
> you to believe such a thing.  I swear it used to be only the Esperantists
> who brought up Esperanto at every opportunity.

If you look at the subject line - you will see that it 'was Re: Rubbish Speak'.
That should give you a clue as to where this started. A little extrapolation
could lead you to realise that someone said there were native speakers of
Esperanto (later quantified to an enormous 'few hundred' worldwide). This
idea of being a native speaker of Esperanto was questioned, giving rise to
this thread.

-- 

Peter H.C. Hullah                     Technical Services
e-mail: Peter.Hullah@eurocontrol.fr   EUROCONTROL Experimental Centre
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