Well while I can’t say I agree with everything you say, your responses have been thought provoking. Aside from my views on the Esperanto movement, I’ll always promote Esperanto as a linguistic tool, because it is in fact easier than most natural languages, for speakers of any tongue. While I will admit that speakers of languages from other linguistic families around the world obviously don’t have the same advantages as native speakers of indo-european languages, the agglutinative nature of Esperanto makes it much easier than other types of languages, by sheer virtue of the fact that vocabulary acquisition is much more rapid than in other languages. China has one of the higher populations of Esperantists, despite their linguistic disadvantage. With that being said, I do agree with you that Esperanto is not neutral and is an impractical choice for a lingua franca. “Racist and pro-genocide” though? That’s just inflammatory.
Saying that the movement is pro-genocide implies that they support slaughtering entire cultures, and not in the figurative “oh you’re assimilating us into a predominantly white society, our culture is slaughtered!” way, in the mass death way. By striving to create intercultural communication across the world, are they inadvertantly striving to smother local cultures? That is something that one could debate for days without a clear answer, but the fact that the question needs asking suggests plausibility, and I acknowledge your point there. Perhaps a lingua franca isn’t feasible, and if it is, perhaps it isn’t right to pursue.
However, that is not genocide by any stretch, and in your word choice you’ve taken a legitimate argument about the ethics of the Esperanto movement and turned it into openly uninformed antagonism in the eyes of the Esperantists (of which there are quite a few) who have read your posts on the issue. Because of your poor execution, instead of a discussion centered around the possible need for a radical reevaluation of the purpose and goals of Esperanto (for instance, I think it should be required in primary/elementary schools with natural languages required in levels of education higher than that, and no required focus on Esperanto past the first levels. I believe Tim Morley expounds on that in a Tedx talk if you’re interested), it has become a passing phase of outrage that will have no effect whatsoever a week from now.
Forgive the “notepaper” format but if there’s a more effective way to send long messages on Tumblr I don’t know it.Esperanto is only easier to learn for people who speak Indo-European languages. Its grammar, script and lexicon are completely foreign to anyone who doesn’t speak an Indo-European language, and while I concede that agglutination can in some instances make vocabulary acquisition easier, this too is drastically limited because different cultures don’t all share their understandings of the same concept - e.g., the Esperanto word for hospital is “malsanulejo”, mal-sanu-lejo, which literally translates to “un-health-place” or “sick-place”. This corresponds to the literal translation of the word for hospital in almost every Germanic and Slavic language (Swedish “sjukhus” (sick-house), Dutch “ziekenhuis” (sick-house), Serbo-Croat “bolnica” (injury-house), etc) but wouldn’t be entirely obvious to someone whose language renders the word for hospital as “healing house” (Thai) or “medicine building” (Mandarin), i.e. someone whose culture emphasizes the healing aspect of a hospital over the fact that lots of sick or injured people go there. Things get much, much hairier when you’re dealing with more abstract concepts, which is one of the reasons translations of religious and philosophical texts can be so contentious - in fact, it’s one of the reasons why certain words go untranslated in philosophical texts (think: Schadenfreude, logos, connaissance de soi, savoir de soi, gedankenexperiment).
Linguistic disadvantage can be overcome - virtually every imperialist language including English has proven that (and the Chinese have a particular advantage in learning Esperanto seeing as the Chinese government has been funding and promoting Esperanto language education since the 80’s) - that’s hardly my point. In harping on the linguistic and cultural biases of Esperanto the point I hope to drive home is that the language itself alienates people who don’t speak Indo-European languages. If you agree that Esperanto is Eurocentric, then why would you continue to promote its use as an international auxiliary language? Do you not see how that would be alienating to someone who isn’t European, particularly someone whose people have been subjected to colonization and continual reinforcement over the centuries that their ways of doing things, their spiritual traditions, their understandings of the world, their philosophical traditions, and even their languages are inferior to European ways of doing things, European spiritual traditions, European understandings of the world, European philosophical traditions and European languages? Do you not see how it would be alienating for people to be made to learn a language unrelated to their own which bears striking resemblances to the languages of people who brutalized and massacred their ancestors (and banned their languages) and who continue to brutalize them by way of multinational corporations, parasitic trade agreements, debt and military force (either overt or by proxy) if things get out of hand? If you insist that an international auxiliary language is even necessary, then be the one to scrap Esperanto and create something truly neutral, made from an a priori vocabulary with a more analytic (isolating) grammar which avoids traits commonly associated with imperialist or colonialist languages. It’ll be harder for you and for Europeans to learn, but at least you’ll be able to sell the neutrality point with a straight face and you won’t be upholding the virtues of European cultural hegemony.
As far as genocide goes, listen closely. If you walk away having learned only one thing from this post, let it be this:
Most genocide doesn’t occur in concentration camps.
Most genocide is slow, painful and violent. It takes place over the course of generations, generations which are forced to live with the constant reinforcement of the myth of their own inferiority, forced to contend with impossible conditions which almost always include some form of economic violence, which is real violence - the kind that results in real death and real suffering for real people. When this occurs systemically, on a large scale - as indigenous people everywhere in the world face - it does actually result in “mass death”, which, coupled with overwhelming pressures to assimilate, results in the gradual erasure of culture - i.e. genocide. The difference between this kind of genocide and the genocide that you’re referring to is that the kind of genocide you’re referring to is a conspiracy devised by a few people enabled by a supremacist cultural mythology. The kind of genocide I am talking about, the kind that is most common and most dangerous because it happens so quietly by comparison, is a conspiracy devised and executed by entire cultures. Language plays an important role in that conspiracy, as language is the primary vehicle of enculturation.
The aims of the Esperanto movement are at odds with linguistic and cultural diversity, and that Esperanto, if adopted globally, would inevitably supplant local languages in the same way imperialist languages have. In virtually every instance, the emergence of a lingua franca signals the demise of local languages - from English, to Swahili, to Mandarin to Latin to Tagalog to Spanish - and with the language dies the culture. Today 80% of the world speaks 1.1% of its languages. At the current rate, roughly 40% of the languages still spoken will be extinct in 10 years. Those rates are the rates of a world where Esperanto has not reached global prominence, where the UN has not recommended that its member states create Esperanto education programs, where people have not yet been given another reason to teach their children the languages of their parents and grandparents.
I don’t personally give a fuck if Esperantists feel antagonized about my use of language and how I may have averted a re-evaluation of the language by being honest: the language doesn’t need to be re-evaluated, it needs to be shelved. If you know this to be true and you proceed to advocate for the widespread use of Esperanto, you are advocating genocide - sometimes the truth hurts, and I don’t care to pussyfoot to avoid hurting anyone’s feelings. All i can tell you is that if you are passionate about language and language diversity then learn natural languages, particularly those of your ancestors, particularly those which are marginalized, and support and encourage others to do the same. Focus on yourself, focus on your own community and your own people - the closer the better. The most valuable linguistic tool you can have is an appreciation and respect for the diversity of human languages… the understanding that it’s not a problem or an obstacle which needs to be overcome, but one of the keys to our success as a species. It allows for variance in cultural practices, in experience, in thought, in food, in music, in art. Learn Esperanto if you will, but don’t advocate its widespread international adoption. The Esperantos before it have done enough damage.
All of the above; boldings mine.
I really don’t like the Esperanto movement but thanks to the reply above, I don’t need to say anything.
Hosni Mubarak was found guilty of allowing the deaths of at least 800 protesters in the 18-day uprising that toppled his presidency in 2011. He was given a life sentence, which he will serve in Torah prison in southern Cairo. Given a life sentence alongside him was his former interior minister Habib el-Adly. The corruption charges leveled against his sons, Gamal and Alaa, were dropped.
The picture above was taken and tweeted by Al Jazeera’s @glcarlstrom, and is of parents outside the courthouse who have dropped to their knees crying over the portrait of their martyred son after hearing the news of the verdict.
[Al Jazeera] [@RichardEngelNBC] [AP] [@glcarlstrom]
A very evocative photograph, on a very emotional day for the people of Egypt.
Jon Stewart (via deathofadollmaker)
Accurate.
I have always wanted to rage quit. Fuck I’m excited.