Unfortunately that might carry more weight if Esperanto didn't have vocabulary, grammar/syntax structures chosen from other language; resulting in situations where some things like different word orders can all be 'right' and sometimes reflect the nationality of the user (e.g. Russian or Brazilian usages of Esperanto compared to English Esperantists).
You can say it isn't just English (or whatever language) just transferred, but in some cases it actually just is. How many times do we hear things like: that resembles Polish, or Russian or Italian...etc?

I think speakers of European languages get confused sometimes by the arbitrary choices of certain words or syntaxes, seeing no recognisable pattern.

Vestitor:Unfortunately that might carry more weight if Esperanto didn't have vocabulary, grammar/syntax structures chosen from other language; resulting in situations where some things like different word orders can all be 'right' and sometimes reflect the nationality of the user (e.g. Russian or Brazilian usages of Esperanto compared to English Esperantists).
You can say it isn't just English (or whatever language) just transferred, but in some cases it actually just is. How many times do we hear things like: that resembles Polish, or Russian or Italian...etc?

I think speakers of European languages get confused sometimes by the arbitrary choices of certain words or syntaxes, seeing no recognisable pattern.

How is it more arbitrary than other European languages, or any other language in the world, for that matter? And how does choosing a form make it worse, and what kind of recognisable pattern were you looking for? A pattern based on what language?

Everyone comes from a certain linguistic background, and every language has to make a choice about how to express some things, so even if it's the easiest language in the world, there are going to be certain things that will hit you as "Wow, that's a weird way to express that, why'd they choose such a weird way?". In fact, it only seems weird due to your own linguistic background, and other aspects of the language that strike you as ordinary and logical might strike someone else as weird, due to their linguistic background.

As an example - Romance languages express certain ideas with reflexive verbs, things that you would absolutely never guess, based on English, could or should be reflexive. It seems strange and arbitrary. But I'm sure it seems normal to native speakers of those languages.

erinja:How is it more arbitrary than other European languages, or any other language in the world, for that matter? And how does choosing a form make it worse, and what kind of recognisable pattern were you looking for? A pattern based on what language?

Everyone comes from a certain linguistic background, and every language has to make a choice about how to express some things, so even if it's the easiest language in the world, there are going to be certain things that will hit you as "Wow, that's a weird way to express that, why'd they choose such a weird way?". In fact, it only seems weird due to your own linguistic background, and other aspects of the language that strike you as ordinary and logical might strike someone else as weird, due to their linguistic background.

As an example - Romance languages express certain ideas with reflexive verbs, things that you would absolutely never guess, based on English, could or should be reflexive. It seems strange and arbitrary. But I'm sure it seems normal to native speakers of those languages.

Well, the fact that Esperanto didn't develop like a national language does pose questions for why certain structures and word choices exist, since they were deliberately selected. For a national language you have to say "well, that's just how it developed.." usually for historical reasons like e.g. Napoleonic invasions.

I find that there are loads of easy vocabulary items in Esperanto because there are so many English (or Latin through Norman French into English) cognates. No complaint there. There is however something to say about odd variations of word order and syntax that seem to have been interpolated from various languages. You don't get this in national languages quite as much (in some not at all) on quite the same scale. Indeed when it does happen, the regularity of syntax makes an oddity stick out like a sore thumb as shows it up as a borrowed construction

I don't know why you persist in pursuing a line of argument which makes it appear as if I am complaining that Esperanto is not English and is confusing me with structures from other languages; it's not the case. I speak three other languages than English, two of them on a daily basis.

Vestitor:There is however something to say about odd variations of word order and syntax that seem to have been interpolated from various languages. You don't get this in national languages quite as much (in some not at all) on quite the same scale. Indeed when it does happen, the regularity of syntax makes an oddity stick out like a sore thumb as shows it up as a borrowed construction

I don't know why you persist in pursuing a line of argument which makes it appear as if I am complaining that Esperanto is not English and is confusing me with structures from other languages; it's not the case. I speak three other languages than English, two of them on a daily basis.

It's not that you're complaining that Esperanto isn't English. It's that I have no idea what on earth you are talking about. If someone asked me to come up with an examples of odd variations of word order and syntax in Esperanto, I couldn't, because I genuinely am not experiencing what you seem to be experiencing in this regard, and the way Esperanto works makes fine sense to me. It is not a Romance, Germanic, or Slavic language, so if it doesn't fit into one of these molds very well, this truly doesn't bother me or seem irregular. I am not sure if this is what you were getting at when you say things weren't as you would expect them to be, because I am mystified about exactly what you were expecting and why.

bartlett22183:Some of the students simply could not comprehend why (pseudo-)French "Je suis allant" was not a perfectly good equivalent to English "I am going" rather than "Je vais." They were totally oblivious to the fact that different languages are not simply relexifications of each other

That is how I used to think about languages

Vestitor:There is however something to say about odd variations of word order and syntax that seem to have been interpolated from various languages. You don't get this in national languages quite as much (in some not at all) on quite the same scale.

Could you explain in more detail this point, please. I am really having a hard time to follow your train of argumentation.

How can any aspect of syntax, including word order, of some language (be it Esperanto, be it any national language) be odd? There is no doubt that e.g. English word order (Because you called me, I called you back) and German word order (Because you me called have, have I you back called.) are quite distinct, but this doesn't mean that either one is odd. The German word order is natural and normal for German, while the English word order is natural and normal for English. The only possible way I can think of that would justify to call the syntax of a language is odd, would be that one actually expects the other language to be only a relexification (as mentioned before).

Isn't it like saying "Look, snails are odd: they carry their house on their back"? This isn't odd, this is natural and normal for snails; however a bear who carries around its lair on its back would be indeed an oddity.

Because you called me, I called you back. (eng)
Because you me called have, have I you back called. (deu)
Because me called, you called back. (esp)
Due to my calling by you, you I called back. (qeq)

Which one is odd?

You have answered your own question. The examples you gave are natural and normal for their respective languages because word order and syntax patterns in a language have a certain recognisable uniformity. This is why it's easy for a native to spot writing or speech from a foreign speaker.

Obviously I did not say such normal structures are odd within their own languages; that is nonsensical.

Vestitor:You have answered your own question. The examples you gave are natural and normal for their respective languages because word order and syntax patterns in a language have a certain recognisable uniformity. This is why it's easy for a native to spot writing or speech from a foreign speaker.

Obviously I did not say such normal structures are odd within their own languages; that is nonsensical.

So when is something odd in Esperanto? Isn't each feature of Esperanto normal within Esperanto itself? How can something which is integral part of Esperanto be odd with Esperanto itself? Odd compared to what?

I am really just trying to understand and I am intrigued about this argument.

Could you name an example which is odd within Esperanto itself, because it differs strongly from other related Esperanto features and therefore sticks out?

Are you referring to something like using "Vin vidis mi" instead of "Mi vidis vin"?

Well it's odd in Esperanto (and I want to take the learner's point of view) because there is syntax/word order transplanted from more than one language. Some of them are just haphazard. I can't pull dozens of examples out so let's say e.g:

I arrived ten years ago - Mi alvenis antaŭ dek jaroj (so literally: I arrived before ten years).

That odd construction isn't in Italian, or English or Dutch or Polish...in Russian it refers to years 'back'; I don't think it resembles Chinese or Turkish. It does however turn up in both German and Czech. But then it seems odd to have these bits and bobs of German or Czech sitting alongside a majority Latinate vocabulary and syntax from Latinate languages. Like a limp token stab at internationalism, and a choice of the least international form!

'Before' ten years is unintuitive for so many possible learners. In fact I saw it happening when I was going through the Duolingo course. Then one of the very few pre-Duolingo Esperantists on there would come and insist that 'that's just how it is' as if that is a reasonable answer, but it isn't. Esperanto didn't form naturally, it was built and some of the choices are haphazard, whether people puzzle them out or not.

Bartlett's post got my goat a little because the problems of transliterating or 'relexification' between languages that have organically developed is different; there was no single boss man choosing the grammar, syntax and vocabulary.

vestitor:...

Thanks for bearing with me. I think I now got your point.

I would have never deemed "antaux dek jaroj" as odd. When I was a beginner, I thought "Mi sxatas hundojn." was doubly odd (Why does Esperanto switch object and subject? Why does it drop the article?), but this was just because I was thinking in Spanish.

If we argued that something was odd in Esperanto because some/many/most languages don't say it that way, then everything would be an oddity to some degree.

Just a thought experiment:
Had Zamenhof copied the Romance pattern of "dieci anni fa" or "hace diez años" or "il y a diz ans" into Esperanto, then we would maybe say: "Estas/farigxas dek jaroj (ke/kiam) mi alvenis." How would we say "after ten years"? I have no idea, but we would surely break the neat parallelism between "antaux dek jaroj" and "malantaux dek jaroj".

What would have been a non-odd way, Zamenhof could have used for saying "ten years ago" and "after ten years"?