ceigered:
Let's spare a thought for the Hebrew speakers learning Esperanto - after all, their capital letters (for want of a better term) come at the end of their words regardless of whether the word's a noun, verb or adjective

peR ĉI tiU tujmesaĝilO vI povaS babilI kuN aliaJ uzantoJ dE lernU!. poR ekigI lA mesaĝiloN, alklakU unU eL lA supraJ butonoJ. pliaJ informoJ troveblaS ĉE "helppaĝoJ".

Donniedillon: Yes! Many Esperantists even believe that you should write names like this because, for example, in Japan surnames come before given names, and this helps to find out what's the surname and what's the given name.

Donniedillon:What is the word on surnames? I have seen in some countries where a given name has the first letter capitalized and the surname is all caps (ex. Thomas JEFFERSON). Would this be correct in Esperanto as well?

The Wikipedia page that darkweasel linked to indicates that it is a common convention in Esperanto to fully capitalise family names to avoid the confusion of varying national naming conventions. It gives the examples: "KALOCSAY Kálmán, Leslie CHEUNG Kwok Wing."

I see this usage appear from time to time with some speakers I know, and also on the Esperanto newsgroups. No idea how common it is in general though.

Donniedillon:I have seen in some countries where a given name has the first letter capitalized and the surname is all caps (ex. Thomas JEFFERSON). Would this be correct in Esperanto as well?

My understanding is that the Esperanto convention is the same for first names and surnames, as in the English-speaking world; see, for example, the names on this UEA page.

erinja:But if you choose differently, it isn't necessarily wrong (though there does seem to be pretty much 100% agreement not to capitalize days of the week, so if you're going to pick something to capitalize, I definitely wouldn't choose that)

Cheers Erinja for this note - I'll keep the days of the week in lowercase and probably the names of peoples too (e.g. la ruso kiu ni renkontis ĉe la esperantkunveno povas manĝi kun ni vendrede en Bulgarujo)

Miland:Capitals are often used in the keywords of the titles of papers in academic journals. I understand that it is a German custom. However I don't think that we'd need it much here, unless we're humorously indicating that something is Really Important.

The German doesn't capitalize "keywords" in titles. In fact, the rules of capitalization for titles are the same as they are in any other text: The first word of the sentence and all nouns are capitalized. Unlike in English titles, adjectives are not usually capitalized.

Not that this has anything to do with Esperanto rules.

ceigered:Let's spare a thought for the Hebrew speakers learning Esperanto - after all, their capital letters (for want of a better term) come at the end of their words regardless of whether the word's a noun, verb or adjective

In fact, there is a better term. That term is "final forms," or אותיות סופיות.

ninjaaron_0:

ceigered:Let's spare a thought for the Hebrew speakers learning Esperanto - after all, their capital letters (for want of a better term) come at the end of their words regardless of whether the word's a noun, verb or adjective

In fact, there is a better term. That term is "final forms," or אותיות סופיות.

That's the phrase I was looking for! (the English, no way I'd remember the Hebrew )

I seem to remember seeing the full capitalization of last names being mentioned, in some Esperanto textbook, as being the way it was done in Esperantujo. I don't remember which book it was, though. It may have been the Ivy Kellerman Reed book (which dates from the early days). It just tickles a memory of having seen something about this in an Esperanto text somewhere, but I can't place it.

I do know that I have seen reprinted (English language) newspaper articles from the mid to late 19th century in which the first time a last name was mentioned it was always fully capitalized, but not in subsequent mentions, where it was capitalized normally. It's possible this was some sort of journalistic standard from the period, and perhaps some early Esperantists adopted it.

RiotNrrd:I seem to remember seeing the full capitalization of last names being mentioned, in some Esperanto textbook, as being the way it was done in Esperantujo. I don't remember which book it was, though. It may have been the Ivy Kellerman Reed book (which dates from the early days). It just tickles a memory of having seen something about this in an Esperanto text somewhere, but I can't place it.

It's definitely mentioned in Being Colloquial in Esperanto by David K. Jordan. I don't have it with me right now so I can't give a page number or direct quote. I'll do so when I get home tonight.

Alciona:It's definitely mentioned in Being Colloquial in Esperanto by David K. Jordan.

That sounds quite possible, although I took a look in my copy and couldn't find it. If you do find it, let me know ('cause now it's just bugging me).