Has anyone heard of Esperanto? I found out about it recently. http://how-to-learn-any-language.com/e/languages/esperanto.html
I remember that Esperanto peaked in Bulgaria in the late 80s and early 90s. I also think that DW or other satellite program ran its teletext on Esperanto
First up, I have to confess I'm only here on this forum to chip in about Esperanto, so forgive my interloping. To answer the question above, it's difficult to say exactly -- partly because it's impossible to round up everyone in a hundred and odd countries who's ever learnt the language, and partly because it's difficult to define what level you need to attain before you can call yourself "an Esperanto speaker" -- but the figure usually quoted is "somewhere between 1 and 2 million people". Now, next to English or Spanish, that ain't many, certainly, but for a language that doesn't have a British Council or an army and propagates almost exclusively from person to person by word of mouth, I think that's pretty good. There are 92 countries with a national Esperanto association affiliated with UEA, the world organisation, and numerous other lands where there are Esperanto speakers but no official organisation just yet. <shameless self-promotion> Here's a video clip of me trying to teach Kelly Clarkson a few words. (Give it a minute or two to start -- it has to download an 8Mb video before you'll see anything.) </shameless self-promotion> If you're interested in learning, have a look at the dozen or so free online courses at http://www.lernu.net or look up your nearest local organisation/club by clicking on the English section at http://www.uea.org (If you can't find what you're looking for, drop me a PM and I'll look up someone in your area). Enjoy!
It still amazes me how far this man-made language has come. Some people even consider it to be a natural language now. That's cool that you were able to appear on that popular British show, and with Kelly Clarkson even. The word for stay seems so hard to pronounce.Isn't it that long "T" word? I have been to lernu! before. I heard the courses they provide to learn Esperanto are very good. Currently, I am re-learning my father and his country's native language,French, but I plan on learning this unique language in the future. Thanks for all of the information.
Indeed, it's hard to come up with a definition of "a natural language" that somehow excludes Esperanto without also excluding several others like Nynorsk and Modern Hebrew (which I don't think anybody seriously consider to be anything other than natural languages). There are several much simpler words, like "resti", "loĝi" or "gasti" that would do if you just want to say "stay". The word I used was "tranoktigonton", which -- in one word -- means "someone who's going to give me somewhere to spend the night". Je te félicite pour ta motivation en ce qui concerne les langues étrangères. Bonne chance dans toutes tes études.
That is why I think Esperanto should be considered natural, now. I read that there are so many ways to express yourself in Esperanto. Merci. Je veux parler plusieurs langues (néerlandais, latin,espagnol,portugais,espéranto,russe,italien). Il semble difficile, mais je ferai un effort.
My cat speaks Esperanto. He has never listened to anything I've said in English, French, German, Spanish, or Russian. One day I said to him, "leki via kiel!" and he commenced licking his ass! Remarkable!
Baxter, you know I don't speak Esperanto! In English, please... Edit: So where are the majority of native Esperanto speakers located?
I had heard of Esperanto... but I never really looked into it. Aside from learning lots of vocabulary.... basically, the words for things... it seems like a really easy language to learn... without all the exceptions and oddball verb forms that make no sense in other languages... especially ours. I really just checked into this thread to say that "Esperanto" made the New York Times crossword puzzle on Tuesday! It was the 1A answer! Actually, got curious... looks like it'd been used four times previously... once in the NYT, once in the LA Times, once in the NY Sun, and one publisher whose initials I don't recognize.
I've heard of it. It plays on the speakers of the set in the movie "Gattica" (Or it says so on the closed caption on the movie). They probably mentioned the language during the course of the movie but I don't remember.