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Gender-neutral Esperanto grammar and pronoun ideas.

de 3arin2, 2019-januaro-25

Mesaĝoj: 48

Lingvo: English

3arin2 (Montri la profilon) 2019-januaro-25 09:39:01

Hello everyone.

While thinking about creating a conlang for a book I want to write, I come up with an idea of how to make the way Esperanto handles genders more smooth, at the same time making it look more diverse in terms of how words look in the text while at the same time keeping the integrity of the language intact.

And yes, of course, it is very much possible that someone has already come up with such an idea but I wanted to publish it nonetheless.
And no, I don't try to in some way reform the original language, nor I attempt on creating discord among the community of Esperanto speakers.
It is just that some communities who already know Esperanto can use my ideas for their needs. For example, managing a roleplay game in Esperanto.

So here is what's different:
Nouns without an ending have neutral gender or are used if the gender of a subject or an object is unknown or unspecified.
Nouns that end with ''-o'' have masculine gender and nouns that end with ''-a'' have feminine gender.
The suffix ''-in'' is used to determine if a word is an adjective.
Examples:
Infan - a child
Infano - male child
Infana - female child
Infanin ludil - a children's toy
Infanin ludilo - a ''male'' children's toy (for example, Ken)
Infanin ludila - a ''female'' children's toy (for example, Barbi)

The same goes for pronouns:
Mi - I (for example, when it is unimportant or is a secret which gender the author of the phrase has)
Mio - I (as if written by a male person)
Mia - I (as if written by a female person)
Ni - we
Nio - we (when everyone of the group is male)
Nia - we (when everyone of the group is female, like in Spanish ''Nosotras'')
Li - a gender-neutral pronoun
Lio - he
Lia - she
Ĝi - it (can be referred to any inanimate object)
Ĝio - something that is male but not animate
Ĝia - something that is female but not animate

novatago (Montri la profilon) 2019-januaro-25 12:24:23

It is just that some communities who already know Esperanto can use my ideas for their needs.
If it's only to play...

Ĝis, Novatago (blogo / 7 + 1)

sergejm (Montri la profilon) 2019-januaro-25 17:39:15

Ĉi tio jam ne estas Esperanto, ĉiel ajn.

bartlett22183 (Montri la profilon) 2019-januaro-25 19:32:56

Ho hummm. Yet another after all these generations of a proposal to modify Esperanto. Nothing new, even if the details differ. Esperantists have heard it all before. Create a conlang if you wish with whatever features you wish, but please don't call it Esperanto.

lovelystudent (Montri la profilon) 2019-januaro-28 15:30:44

I think there's nothing wrong with modernizing Esperanto to some degree (even if individual), particularly because, as in any language, as times change new words become necessary (e.g. cellphone). Because the world is becoming exponentially more open in terms of gender and sexuality, I find that inclusion of neutral-gendered words, etc. could be helpful to certain people. Obviously, not everyone has to be "okay" with this, and it should be up to the individual whether or not to use these new words, but I do not think we should necessarily discourage them (even if some may not want to encourage them).

kaŝperanto (Montri la profilon) 2019-januaro-28 16:00:26

I think the only sensible change regarding gender in Esperanto would be a neutral pronoun, for which the top contender is "ri", if I recall correctly. I don't like calling a person "it", and if he/she is not correct then we are certainly lacking a word. Ri seems like a very minor change to the language that should not cause much confusion.

Anything more than this is completely unnecessary, and in fact a regression from where we currently stand. Esperanto threw away the ridiculous concept of gendered words for a reason. Why do I care if it is a boy's toy or a girl's toy? I can already say "virseksa/inseksa ludilo" if I need to clarify this, but that is a very rarely needed clarification IMHO. I care even less if a "we" is a group of males or females, and I can just as easily clarify this if it is relevant for some reason: "ni viroj ĉasos morgaŭ".

I absolutely don't feel such a strong need to clarify genders of things to include this feature in the grammar of the language.

bartlett22183 (Montri la profilon) 2019-januaro-28 20:01:33

I just pointed out a few moments ago in another thread under Viewpoints that Ido already, i.e., from the beginning, has less of a sexism issue than Esperanto (whatever else one may think of Ido).

drinkulo (Montri la profilon) 2019-januaro-30 11:25:48

Your proposal is totally contrary to the foundation of Esperanto, since, for example, the ending '-a' indicates an adjective.
A proposal exists on the other hand, that although it is not official, it is based on the rules of Esperanto and on its Foundation, it is the suffix '-iĉ-'; because in spite of being bothered by some, it does not contradict the rules of the Foundation, besides coming from them (the rule about the diminutives of proper names '-ĉj-' and '-nj-')

呼格吉勒图 (Montri la profilon) 2019-februaro-01 08:19:02

Kvankam mi ankaŭ ne ŝatas genro-diskriminacion, mi pensas ke via propono rompis la bazan strukturon de la lingva sistemo de esperanto. Sed mi ne havas pli bonan solvon pri tio. Alie mi pensas ke naciaj aŭ naturaj lingvoj preskaŭ ankaŭ havas iagrade genro-diskriminacion, kiu ne estas la malboneco de lingvoj, sed la malboneco de kultura evoluo, de historio, ktp. Do lingvoj ne estas genro-diskriminacio, sed la uloj, kiuj uzas lingvojn, povas esti genro-diskriminaciaj, pro la kultura fono kaj la koncepto en iliaj cerboj.

martinkl (Montri la profilon) 2019-februaro-06 13:34:12

Unue, bonvolu pardoni mian Esperanton. Estas pli ol dudek jarojn ek de mi uzis la lingvon kaj mi forgesis multajn vortojn.
Mi ne kredas ke iu bezonas esti ŝanĝita. Estas eble la pli facile lingvo lerni, estas logika kaj inĝenia pri ĝia uzado de affiksoj por formi vortojn se oni ne povas memori la ĝustan vorton. Ĉi tiu trajto estas, por mi, unu el la plej allogaj kialoj por lerni Esperanton. Ankaŭ mi opinias ke ĝi estas eble unu el la kialoj ke la lingvon daŭras. Se ni tro multe ŝanĝas Esperanton, ni riskas ruinigi iom ke funkcias perfekte bone. Estas Anglan popoldiro: If it ain't broken, don't fix it! (Se ĝi ne estas rompita, ne riparu ĝin!)
Mi ne kredas ke Esperanto estas rompita.

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