Mesaĝoj: 76
Lingvo: English
super-griek (Montri la profilon) 2007-februaro-08 16:20:41
Islander:I'd like some further explanation here: I personally don't understand why Esperanto's syntaxis marks it as Germanic.
Overall phrase construction,
Islander: subject oriented gender (as opposed to object oriented of Romance languages),Are you talking about possessive pronouns here? Anyway, we shouldn't forget Esperanto's "possessive pronouns" are actually personal pronouns turned into adjectives, and that certainly isn't what Germanic languages do. And also, in Esperanto nouns do not have any gender; so gender cannot be oriented towards any subject, also. The things that can change (-n, -j) are oriented to the subject:
Li batas sian hundon .
He hits his dog.
Tiu patro malamas siajn gefilojn.
That father hates his children.
Islander:lack of a 2nd person singular pronounAs far as I know, English is the only Germanic language that does not have the distinction, and it did have it in the past.
Dutch:
Jij-jullie
German:
Du-ihr
Early Modern English (or at least I think that's the way Shakespearanian English is called):
Thou-ye
Islander (Montri la profilon) 2007-februaro-09 00:25:15
I'd like some further explanation here: I personally don't understand why Esperanto's syntaxis marks it as Germanic.How the systax is defined overall is what makes it Germanic in origin and the few examples I've listed do confirm that.
Are you talking about possessive pronouns here?Yes, in part. For exmaple, in a Romance language such as French, most objects have a gender (e.g. a table is a female noum, thus in French one would say sa table to says His or Hers with no distinction to the subject's gender. This is one of the most difficult distinction for Germanic based speakers when learning a Romance based language, and vice versa (a native French speaker would be tempted to say "the table, she is heavy").
As far as I know, English is the only Germanic language that does not have the distinction, and it did have it in the past.I'm aware of the "Thou" of the english language. This is, however, more presented as an impersonal pronoum than one defining quantity (of subject).
These may not have been the best examples, but the definitions of Esperanto you may find over the Internet do outline this and I do personally find easier to corrolate what I learn in Espenrato with English as fr as syntax is concern just as I find it easier to corrolate the ethimology to French.
EL_NEBULOSO (Montri la profilon) 2007-februaro-09 11:37:49
actually, in German we have 4 different possessive pronouns in the singular forms:
sein, seine, ihr, ihre
sein: the subject is male (or "saechlich", the third non-mal, non-female), the object is male (or saechlich)
seine: the subject is male (or saechlich), the object female
ihr: subject female, object male (or saechlich)
ihre: subject female, object female
OK, we have 4 variants, depending on the subject and the object, usually, we would have 9 (3x3) but the third gender (das, like das Kind, the child) behaves like male (towards possessive pronouns).
Gerald
T0dd (Montri la profilon) 2007-februaro-09 18:44:31
Japanese has something rather like the table of correlatives.
As for why Esperanto hasn't "caught on" internationally the way English has... I don't doubt that it has a lot to do with the economic reach of the anglophone countries. Films and recordings and books are certainly written in languages other than English, but the ones in English find their way into all corners of the world, propelled by money. Add to that the fact that there are still many--including many linguists--who believe that an artificial language "can't possibly work"--and it's not surprising that Esperanto's growth hasn't been what Zamenhof hoped for.
As for English being simpler than Esperanto....in some ways, yes. Invariant adjectives are simpler than adjectives that take grammatical endings. There are no doubt a few other ways in which it is simpler. But there are *countless* ways in which it is more complicated--so many that I don't know where to begin (although the spelling is a good starting point).
EL_NEBULOSO (Montri la profilon) 2007-februaro-09 23:37:58
Anyway, it's a long time ago that I learned English, but only to learn all the exceptions from basic rules (like irregular verbs) takes more time than to learn Esperanto.
And the most important point: If you know the rules from Esperanto, you are (theoretically) able to build up (nearly) all words. Try to do that in any other language!
In other languages it's mostly about learning and not about thinking. In Esperanto it's the other way round. And that really pleases me!
I don't know too much about Esperanto but after learning several other languages, Esperanto seems to be real fun (to learn).
Anyway, English has economics (as stated by T0dd) on it's side and also in case you ask somebody to learn Esperanto they will ask you things like:
1. How many people speak the language?
2. Will it be an advantage in my job?
3. Does my bookstore around the corner have books in Esperanto?
4. What about newspapers, radio, DVDs, films...
All of these things rather would favor English (and other languages).
I think, that Esperanto still would be the most cost effective (in terms of time an energy spent) language but this only counts once a critical mass of people speaks and uses (writing, films ...) the language, so communication is possible also outside the (still) small community of Esperantists...
Gerald
Electric Prophet (Montri la profilon) 2007-februaro-10 06:41:26
Islander:It was mentioned that Esperanto did not become what it was supposed to (not yet, anyway). It wasn't clearly stated why.First off, I would not consider this a philosophical question, but seeing as to how we could hash out the definition of philophy I will not argue. I'm hear to make friends, not start debates, k?
In my opinion, one of the reason is the influence the US and UK/Commonwealth had over the world in the last century (military, economically, culturally...) and how the english language is a simpler language to learn than most other western languages and probably even simpler than Esperanto itself through immersion by all accessible media (TV, Internet, ...).
What do you think?
But I would also argue that English is very hard language to learn. Although you do have a point that because of all modes of media are primarily in English, it can be difficult to learn other languages, I would remind you that English is the third most difficult language to master (although I have yet to see that stipulated).
Esperanto, unlike English, can be immersed in. Although one could come to America, it would not necessarily mean they would start picking up the language. But when I came to this website I actually preferred to be immersed in Esperanto through reading Esperanto, listening to it, and then answering questions in Esperanto; because it made me think in Esperanto. That is a very powerful thing. As a Latin student, to think in another language means that that langage has penetrated the deepest parts of your brain where it will stay much easier than just trying to memorize a bunch of vocabulary.
EL_NEBULOSO (Montri la profilon) 2007-februaro-10 09:40:28
what source claims that English is the third most difficult language to master?
From what I know (personal experience) and what I heard from friends who speak several languages, as well as from more professional sources, English is the easiest language of the bigger Western European languages to learn (German, French, English, Italian, Spanish). From those, supposedly German ist the most difficult and Russian is supposed to be about as difficult as German...
Gerald
Pino (Montri la profilon) 2007-februaro-10 10:53:07
erinja: I think that the US and the Commonwealth don't really matter that much. If it's in someone's economic best interest to learn a language, they will.I think too that the economic argument is major. Yet we can no longer work without English and we are bad parents, if our children don't speak English.
The economic cost of learning the English language is enormous. But that is not a fatality, we can imagine a more equitable system.
Electric Prophet (Montri la profilon) 2007-februaro-10 19:11:02
EL_NEBULOSO:Hi,Again, I have yet to see it stipulated but I've been told numerous times that it is. Therefor I took them at their word. Although I had my doubts (considering Mandorin, Katanese, Japanese, Korean, Russian, you name it it's probably harder than English...)
what source claims that English is the third most difficult language to master?
Gerald
erinja (Montri la profilon) 2007-februaro-10 22:45:55
EL_NEBULOSO:sources, English is the easiest language of the bigger Western European languages to learn (German, French, English, Italian, Spanish). From those, supposedly German ist the most difficult and Russian is supposed to be about as difficult as German...I think it depends on what language you're coming from. Perhaps for a German speaker it would be easier, but if you start off speaking something like Spanish, I think Italian or French would be vastly easier than English.
Gerald