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Gender Neutrality...

de Kalantir, 2011-oktobro-15

Mesaĝoj: 162

Lingvo: English

Kalantir (Montri la profilon) 2011-oktobro-15 15:36:31

Recently I noticed the lack of a masculine equivalent of the -in suffix which led me to notice the fairly large number of roots which are masculine by default. This makes words like "parent" awkward. Eventually, I came across this Wikipedia article

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gender_reform_in_Espe...

In that article, it states that some people have started using the suffix -icx as a masculine equivalent of -in. But I was just curious how many Esperanto speakers would understand me if I were to use it? It seems like a good idea to me and I'm rather curious why this wasn't a feature to begin with.

How come everyone hasn't begun using it? Is there a valid reason not to?

patrik (Montri la profilon) 2011-oktobro-15 15:40:53

Kalantir:Recently I noticed the lack of a masculine equivalent of the -in suffix which led me to notice the fairly large number of roots which are masculine by default. This makes words like "parent" awkward. Eventually, I came across this Wikipedia article

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gender_reform_in_Espe...

In that article, it states that some people have started using the suffix -iĉ as a masculine equivalent of -in. But I was just curious how many Esperanto speakers would understand me if I were to use it? It seems like a good idea to me and I'm rather curious why this wasn't a feature to begin with.

How come everyone hasn't begun using it? Is there a valid reason not to?
Perhaps it is due to an acquired resistance to reforms.

RiotNrrd (Montri la profilon) 2011-oktobro-15 15:53:02

Kalantir:Recently I noticed the lack of a masculine equivalent of the -in suffix...
We have the prefix "vir-".

Except for certain words (mostly having to do with family members; patro, frato, etc.), nouns do not have a default gender.

"Kato" is not a tomcat, for example; it is just a cat. If you want to call attention to its gender, you can use either "virkato" or "katino". And so on.

Kalantir (Montri la profilon) 2011-oktobro-15 15:57:16

RiotNrrd:
Kalantir:Recently I noticed the lack of a masculine equivalent of the -in suffix...
We have the prefix "vir-".
Are you sure that's official? I don't see it listed in the wiki article http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Esperanto_vocabulary#...

And it also seems a bit inconsistent to use a prefix for masculine and suffix for feminine. Plus, wouldn't the word virino be an oxymoron?

RiotNrrd (Montri la profilon) 2011-oktobro-15 15:59:43

Yes, "vir" is an official* prefix.

I see no inconsistency in using a prefix for one and a suffix for the other. The simple state of being a suffix or a prefix does not imply an additional meaning related to that state.

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* Although since you can use any root (where it makes sense) as a prefix, I'm not sure what the difference between something "official" and something that is just a root-put-first might be.

RiotNrrd (Montri la profilon) 2011-oktobro-15 16:10:59

Kalantir:Plus, wouldn't the word virino be an oxymoron?
That's one of the oddball words. My advice is to just accept it (because it's a firmly established word that isn't going anywhere at this point).

Kalantir (Montri la profilon) 2011-oktobro-15 16:16:36

RiotNrrd:My advice is to just accept it (because it's a firmly established word that isn't going anywhere at this point).
It seems like I don't have much of a choice in the matter, but I feel like that sort of outlook is what prevents Esperanto from being a popular choice for a second language. People seem to really dislike change...

RiotNrrd (Montri la profilon) 2011-oktobro-15 16:24:12

Kalantir:People seem to really dislike change...
Of course. If the language was constantly changing, who would want to learn it?

"Tell me when it's done, then I'll learn it".

The resistance to change is one of the reasons Esperanto has as many speakers as it does compared to its competitors. The rules of Ido, for example, kept shifting, and a direct result is that people now generally consider Ido little more than a curiousity. Esperanto has had lasting power BECAUSE it is stable. The value of that stability cannot be overestimated.

RiotNrrd (Montri la profilon) 2011-oktobro-15 16:44:49

Kalantir:... but I feel like that sort of outlook is what prevents Esperanto from being a popular choice for a second language.
As opposed to what?

I'm not sure the French get all that excited about suggestions for "improvements" to French. I've certainly made the argument that having three different words for "the" (just in the nominative case) in German is too complicated; but the Germans don't seem to have jumped onto that bandwagon and fixed it for me. English has a completely schizophrenic spelling system, but ALL of the reform projects just don't seem to go anywhere.

I don't know that the Poles are all that wild about making lots of changes to Polish to try and attract new speakers. If the Chinese would just start using an alphabet and drop that whole "tones" thing, people might be more willing to learn Chinese; but they seem kind of resistant to that as well.

And so on.

flipe (Montri la profilon) 2011-oktobro-15 17:46:28

I think that idea so ridiculous, some people try to do it just for start reforms on Esperanto, unnecessary of course! Esperanto just use suffixes and prefixes to show important ideas, necessary ideas, and Zamenhof have choose the female gender to be distinguished, where's the problem? Beyond Esperanto don't need to distinguish all gender, just one, Esperanto don't have gender, patro works for "mother" and "father", we just use "in" to enhance sense of woman person, not for sexism!

Look, we don't use something like "if" to opposite "fi", we need just "fi", same for "ek", for "duon" and neither to "estr", so, why we need of something like "iĉ"?

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