Why would I learned a constructed language that only two million people in the world speak when there are other “more useful” languages I could learn?
*cough cough* Spanish.
I’m so glad you asked.
1. Esperanto lets my childhood dreams live.
Esperanto is the closest thing to living out that childhood dream of speaking in a language that only you and your best friend know.
I know I’m one among the many who thought it would be cool to communicate with my childhood friends in a language that only we could understand.
Esperanto is like that.
Minus the fact that none of my friends speak Esperanto.
Minus the fact that this constructed language required no actual linguistic creation from me.
BUT, I digress and you get the point.
2. Esperanto is supposedly mad easy.
Esperanto is so easy you can supposedly be fluent by tomorrow.
Okay, not literally.
However, Esperanto is easy because of a few key features:
- Simple grammar
- Easy pronunciation
- Phonetic writing system
What more could a language learner ask for?
3. Did I mention Esperanto is mad easy?
When Mr. L. L. Zamenhof constructed Esperanto, his aim was “to render the study of the language so easy as to make its acquisition mere play to the learner”.
Easy and play.
Those are two words you don’t hear very often when learning languages.
I take my hat off to Mr. Zamenhof who designed Esperanto to resemble those ideals.
The logical and regular construction of Esperanto gets you out of the tangles of grammar and into fluency, or what feels like fluency, faster than other languages.
4. Learning Esperanto first makes other languages easier to learn.
I’ve heard around the interwebs, that learning Esperanto first makes other languages much easier to learn.
This is especially true with Romance languages (Spanish, Portuguese, Italian, Romanian, Catalan, and French).
My man Mr. Zamenhof borrowed heavily from the Romance and Germanic language families.
This makes Esperanto a hearty, melodic concoction of two parts Romance and one part Germanic.
This etymological mixture is probably the reason why Esperanto has a nice balance between sweet sounding vowels found in Romance languages and those harsher constants sound customary to Dutch, German, and English.
Since I plan on learning six languages (AKA as many as possible), it only makes sense to do everything to make the process easier and more fun.
5. Esperanto nurtures my socially conscious side.
Esperanto was created to be a neutral universal language.
Albeit, no language can be neutral because of the sheer number of languages available to compile into one.
Esperanto is heavily influenced by Romance and Germanic languages leaving out Afro-Asiatic, Sino-Tibetan, and other language families.
This skew already makes Esperanto non-neutral.
Where Esperanto shines is in its aim to be as inclusive and easy as possible.
As an idealist and an optimist, as a lover of words and culture, the idea of a universal language that helps to preserve, not replace, already existing languages and facilitate easy communication sounds like a future I want to be a part of.
How could I ask for more motivation than that?
What do you think?
Let me know your thoughts and feelings about Esperanto.
Does it hold its own as a neutral, universal language?
Are there more viable options out there that I don’t know of? Let me know.
Hasta luego!
Tchau!
À plus tard!
Ciao!
[…] Adiaŭ! […]
LikeLike
[…] Adiaŭ! […]
LikeLike
[…] Adiaŭ homoj. […]
LikeLike
[…] Adiaŭ homoj. […]
LikeLike
[…] Adiaŭ homoj. […]
LikeLike
[…] Adiaŭ! […]
LikeLike
[…] Adiaŭ! […]
LikeLike
[…] Listen to 3 hours of Esperanto […]
LikeLike
[…] is Esperanto? What is language? What is […]
LikeLike
[…] Adiaŭ! […]
LikeLike
[…] they’re weren’t many options to pick from for the Esperanto […]
LikeLike
[…] Adiaŭ! […]
LikeLike
[…] Saluton homoj! […]
LikeLike
I wrote two poems in Esperanto:
https://rubensbeserra.wordpress.com/category/esperanto/
LikeLiked by 1 person
Hey Rubens! Thanks for checking out Polyglot Path. Are you a native speaker of Esperanto?
LikeLiked by 1 person
Native speaker?? There is no native speaker of Esperanto. That is an artificial languages created by Zamenhof to be universal. Therefore its grammar is so easy. Anyone can learn it. 😀
LikeLike
I think I need to clarify what I mean by a native speaker. When I say native speaker I don’t mean that Esperanto is restricted to one group of people or land similarly to how Latin once was or Italian now is (although to a lesser degreee now due to globalization).
By native speaker I mean they were exposed and taught Esperanto in the same way that a native Spanish speaker learns from their family and the people around them.
Here are some links to explain further:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Native_Esperanto_speakers
https://blogs.transparent.com/esperanto/3rd-gen-native-esperanto-speaker-nicole/
LikeLiked by 1 person
Okay, I will check it out.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Mi ŝatas la linio “Miaj piedoj sangadas pro la longa marŝo.” Viaj poemoj estas belaj.
I used Google translate to understand most of it, but your command of Esperanto is beautiful. I look forward to reading more of your work without the barrier of translation.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Dankon! Esperanto estas facila kaj bela lingvo. Mi ŝatas la poezion gotikan, do miaj poezaĵoj estas malhelaj. 😀
LikeLiked by 1 person
Malhelaj, jes. Sed mi povus rilati. Have you read any books in Eŝperanto.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Jes, iuj libroj. La lasta estis “Murdo en la Orienta Ekspreso”, de Agatha Christie. Mi havas multajn librojn Esperante.
LikeLike
Mi ne legis tiun libron de Agatha Christie. Mi legis “The Murder of Roger Ackroyd.” How did you learn vocabulary?
LikeLiked by 1 person
With a dictionary. The vocabulary is very easy. 😀
LikeLiked by 1 person
Esperanto is a really cool language and definitely worth learning. I learned it three years ago and am very glad I did!
LikeLiked by 1 person
Thanks for dropping a comment Robert! How has your progress been over three years? If you have any resources or tips for a new learner, I’d really appreciate them.
LikeLike
Luckily I had a lot of free time when I started studying Esperanto so I was able to progress really quickly. Lernu and Duolingo are very useful but what helped me the most was to download a free online textbook (both “Teach Yourself Esperanto” and “The Esperanto Teacher” are very helpful) because that best suited my learning method.
LikeLike
Thanks for the extra resources. Seeing how I’m roughly a B2 level in Spanish, the logic of Esperanto is easy to pick up.
LikeLike
I’ve seen both of those one the interwebs. Once I get more familiar with the language itself, I might give those a go.
LikeLike