ceigered:

The same situation also applies for any suggested improvement (such as our beloved schwa) to Esperanto, for example:
- It first has to be used by the person wanting it in the language
- It then has to be used for its intended purpose (e.g., "Sẽlamat estas "sekura" aŭ simila vorto") in literature and writing
- It then has to be accepted and written into grammatical literature, e.g. PMEG explaining what this new "ẽ" is mean to be
- it has to be accepted by whoever can accept these kind of things, be it as a recognised unofficial letter or something similar.
- Finally it has to be taught and actually used by everyone.

If it doesn't get far enough, it'll just be forgotten

It is a good joke isn't it ? It is like asking the driver without licence to go on the road to test drive and get the test later.

With the letter/ẽ/ not being included in the alphebet order, how it would be taught to the learners?

Well, i shall end this suggestion here and if there is no professional view or those from the authoritative organisation, my view will remain unchanged.

Cheers

paksu:It is a good joke isn't it ? It is like asking the driver without licence to go on the road to test drive and get the test later.

With the letter/ẽ/ not being included in the alphebet order, how it would be taught to the learners?

It is not a joke. It's how Esperanto works.

The Academy of Esperanto doesn't create language reforms and tell Esperanto teachers to teach them.

Zamenhof, the initiator of Esperanto, gave up his rights to the language, and gave the language to its speakers. Therefore, Esperanto belongs to all of its speakers.

The way that changes happen in Esperanto, it is initiated by the speakers themselves, not by the Academy. The Academy look at forms that are in use and sometimes makes recommendations on which forms are preferred to others. If a new word or form is seen as being (a) in wide use, and (b) relevant to the langauge (not previously existing), then the Academy could proclaim that this element is official.

Certain things can be changed in Esperanto. New meanings can be added to existing words, new words can be added, new grammar endings. But these changes come about in a natural way. Someone makes up a new word that they think is useful. Other people also find the word useful, so they start to use it. When lots of people use it, if the Academy decides that it is a useful word and in wide use, they might make it official.

So if you want to make a change in Esperanto, the change starts with you. You must personally start using Esperanto with the change you suggest, and see if it catches on. That's the only way that changes happen; it's initiated by regular people like us, not by any official organization.

As far as being taught to learners, many Esperanto courses try to include only official elements. It's the same way that most English classes teach correct grammar, and not slang. When the slang forms become "correct", in the future, then maybe classes will teach them. But most language classes teach a fairly traditional form of a language.

As a side note, Paksu, I am trying to understand your point of view better.

I seem to recall, from some time back, that you sent some messages to this forum about names. You were concerned about translating some names into Esperanto, because some of the meaning from the original language might be lost.

It seems to me that correct pronunciation of some names is part of the reason why you are interested in adding the e~ sound to Esperanto, because the names of some places cannot be correctly pronounced without this sound. If I remember right, you specifically mentioned cultural sensitivity in translation.

I understand that names of things can have great significance internationally. A big sports tournament was recently cancelled because of a disagreement over a name of a body of water. Some people might feel offended if their name is mispronounced, or if the names of the cities in their country are mispronounced.

It is a polite thing to do, to try to pronounce someone's name correctly. But it is so difficult to learn all of the sounds in the world, and to pronounce all of these names correctly. I am sure that in Malaysia, the names of American cities are not pronounced with their correct American pronunciation.

So we must all try to be respectful of the feelings of others. But it is also not possible to always pronounce a name with the correct pronunciation, if those sounds aren't found in your language.

But one language can't include the sounds of everyone's language. So even if we include the e~ sound to allow for correct pronunciation of my friend's name, what about a short i and an American R to pronounce my name correctly? Isn't my name as important as my friend's name?

Everyone's name is important. But one language can't have enough sounds to correctly pronounce every name. The best thing is to keep the number of sounds very limited. So maybe we don't have the sounds to pronounce your name correctly, but we don't have the sounds to pronounce my name correctly either. This makes it easy for students, because they must learn only 28 sounds, and not 29, 50, or 100.

My name is not pronounced in Esperanto as it is in English, nor is the name of my town or the name of my country (In fact, Usono sounds nothing like United States). And that's ok. Because it makes it easier for other people to talk to me, if I tell them what my name is and where I come from in a way that they can pronounce. And if they are interested in the real (English) pronunciation of these names and places, then this is a great way for me to share my language and my culture with them.

It's give and take. They try to pronounce my name correctly, and I try to put my name into a form that they can pronounce. It's very much in the spirit of Esperanto, because the point of Esperanto is that I don't have to learn your language, and you don't have to learn mine; rather, we learn a common language, and we meet each other half way.

Therefore, Esperanto doesn't have every sound, and that's ok. Because the way that many Esperanto speakers see it, the spirit of cooperation is the most important, a feeling of international friendship, and of compromise so that we can communicate.

I would very much like to hear your thoughts on this topic. Maybe you could tell us something about how names of people and places are seen in Malaysian culture.

This discussion reminded me of a story. Right before the independence of Brazil from Portugal, the territory of what is Uruguay nowadays was annexed by the Portuguese. When Brazil declared independence, logically Uruguay, which was called Cisplatina then, became part of the Brazilian Empire.

Though, the Uruguayans were not happy about being part of Brazil, so, supported by Argentina, they waged war to achieve independence -- which they won, after all.

The relevant point to this discussion is the following: during the war the Brazilians forced their prisoners to pronounce the word "Joãozinho" (equivalent to the nickname "Johnny" in English). Those who were unable to pronounce it were definitely Uruguayans and would be killed with violence.

"Joãozinho" is a particular difficult word for foreigners, specially those whose mother tongue is Spanish. It would be rather sadistic to demand any of you to pronounce it exactly, as this word has lots of sounds that are particular to Brazilian Portuguese (the IPA transliteration would be roughly [ʒo·ãw·'zĩ·ñu], could you pronounce if your life depended on it?)

As erinja said, there are hundreds of phonemes throughout the world and one cannot learn them all. Every language has to stick to a restricted set of phonemes, otherwise it would be unlearnable. If we were to add the schwa to Esperanto, in order to pronounce Malayan names, why not adding the five nasal vowels of Portuguese and the four of French, which are all different from those of Portuguese, too? Why not adding that whole bunch of weird vowels from the germanic languages and French, too, like the [ø] and the [y]? Not to mention the consonants!

As I've said before, Esperanto would be better off with fewer phonemes, not with more. The smaller the set of sounds we have to learn, the easier to speak with fluency.

erinja:It's give and take. They try to pronounce my name correctly, and I try to put my name into a form that they can pronounce. It's very much in the spirit of Esperanto, because the point of Esperanto is that I don't have to learn your language, and you don't have to learn mine; rather, we learn a common language, and we meet e...

Yes, Madam, I did many posts here not one. I am also heavily involved in promoting Esperanto in my country. The problem arises with the acceptance from the local people.

My concern as it was in the earlier post was that it happens in Asean countries many names and places are having two sounds system as in the course of this threat.

If it is as what you said that the users of Esperanto can have the right to creat the alphebet, it poses nothing to me and i shall look into the possiblity of it.

But as many in the post had said that the fundementa rules of Esperanto have to be rigidly adhered.

For some people it may feel nothing, but for some it is a great offen and what worse is the Esperantists who arrive in my country, in need of emergency would not be understood by the local people.

Language is a branch of communication. If it fails in the situation said, that is the great sorry.

Vilinilo:

If we were to add the schwa to Esperanto, in order to pronounce Malayan names, why not adding the five nasal vowels of Portuguese and the four of French, which are all different from those of Portuguese, too? Why not adding that whole bunch of weird vowels from the germanic languages and French, too, like the [ø] and the [y]? Not to mention the consonants!

As Erinja has said, be as your wish to do it.

What the historical point of illustration is nothing short of examples in the any parts of the world of super power. The killing depended on the pronuciation was to determin not to kill the wrong group of people but they failed to notice there were always many people with language talents could run off with it.

As I've said before, Esperanto would be better off with fewer phonemes, not with more. The smaller the set of sounds we have to learn, the easier to speak with fluency.[//quote]Any easy language should be less grammar items but not phonemes, if that is the case, then Esperanto is having more sounds than Mondlongo and more aplphebets to remember.

I can't believe I just read this whole thread !

And yet I still don't understand, paksu, why you want to add the /ə/ to Esperanto. How would the addition of a sound improve the language?

paksu:The problem arises with the acceptance from the local people.

This is very interesting to me. Have local people told you that they will not learn esperanto because it does not have the e~ sound?

If it is as what you said that the users of Esperanto can have the right to creat the alphebet, it poses nothing to me and i shall look into the possiblity of it.

But as many in the post had said that the fundementa rules of Esperanto have to be rigidly adhered.

I understand that the Fundamento is forever valid, and that if you change it, that this is a new language which can no longer be called "Esperanto".

I don't know if that means that you can't add a letter to the alphabet.

I personally do not support adding a letter to the alphabet.

But there is no such thing as the "Esperanto language police". No one will come and get you if you choose to add a new sound when you speak.

For some people it may feel nothing, but for some it is a great offen

Really, have some people in your country told you that they are offended when a foreigner mispronounces their name? This is a very interesting thing to me. I had a friend in school who was Malaysian, but I still do not know very much about Malaysian culture. So it seems like names and correct pronunciations of names is an impotant part of your culture, is that right?

and what worse is the Esperantists who arrive in my country, in need of emergency would not be understood by the local people.

Esperanto only works with other people who speak it. If the local people do not speak Esperanto, they won't understand me when I talk to them in an emergency, even if I know the name of a place. If they do speak Esperanto, then surely they will know the Esperanto name for this place.

However, the situation in your example seems unbelievable to me. I don't know how that could happen. I have done a lot of international travel in Esperanto. It is hard for me to imagine a situation where I could travel in a country without learning the local names of the places, even though I am only talking to Esperanto speakers. The local name will be written on every local sign ("Welcome to X-town", "X-town Pharmacy"), on every train station and bus station and airport, every means of transportation that I could use to get there. I could not possibly arrive at the place, without knowing that place's correct local name.

I don't think that adding sounds to the language will help travellers. The traveller will probably pronounce it wrong anyway, or mis-remember the name, because it is hard to remember foreign names, especially in a stressful emergency situation. It is a better choice to have the name of the place written on a piece of paper, in the local language, using the local alphabet. The local people can read it, and they will instantly know what the place is.

Even if the foreign name can easily be pronounced with the Esperanto alphabet, I think it's still important to have the name written. If another country uses different spelling or romanization rules than my native language, it might be hard for me to guess how to pronounce the name correctly. For example, the Taiwanese city of Kaohsiung (高雄) is pronounced as "gow-shong". Esperanto has those sounds; it would be written as Gaŭŝjong or Gaŭŝong in Esperanto. No problem to pronounce it!

But if I am reading it, if I see it written in English on a sign, I could not guess the pronunciation and I would definitely pronounce it wrong. Unless someone told me the right pronunciation, or unless I had studied, in advance, the (several!) romanization systems used in Taiwan, I could not guess it. However, if I travel with the name written in Chinese, 高雄, then it doesn't matter if I can pronounce it or not, because the local people can read it. Because in this case, even though the sounds exist in Esperanto, I still need to have the name written, in case of emergency.

(Yes, I know that Chinese has tones, but I am assuming that in an emergency, I will be understood, even saying Kaohsiung's name without tones)

Vilinilo:The relevant point to this discussion is the following: during the war the Brazilians forced their prisoners to pronounce the word "Joãozinho" (equivalent to the nickname "Johnny" in English). Those who were unable to pronounce it were definitely Uruguayans and would be killed with violence.

That's an interesting example off a shibboleth that I haven't heard before.

erinja:

Well, this is the point of the Esperantonists that they have to wait for the local Esperantonist to guide them in the tour unlike other language speakers who would travel far and wide.

Erinja, may i remind you that most Asian countries are quoted with bilingual in their signboards. As you know English and there would have less problem for you.

Would you mind to venture into the rurul areas in Thailand, perhaps in the Esan part, that would see how you would survive without an Esperanto speaking friend when you are in emergency.

Again, in your early post you said one can add to the language and now you said that adding the /ẽ/ is no longer the Esperanto language, how contrary it is.

Therefore, in short, my conclusion is Esperanto is untouchable and no weakness it is been.

I would like to quote that the capital city of Sichuan province is pronouced as Chẽngdu but not as Chengdu. The Yellow River is pronouced as Huang Hẽ but not Huang Ho.

The list would go on just in China itself not to mention the Chẽn clan family in China.

As i read the Mikrofine, a magazine by CRI radio ,the name of the place did not change by adding an o to it.

I am confused now with the highly experinced Esperantoist having two versions of views.