One verse of La Espero (Hope), Esperanto’s anthem reads:
Sur neŭtrala lingva fundamento,
komprenante unu la alian,
la popoloj faros en konsento
unu grandan rondon familian.
On a neutral language basis,
understanding one another,
the peoples will make in agreement
one great family circle.
As I explained in my blog on the history of Esperanto, Zamenhof created this language to promote intercultural awareness and tolerance between countries. Today, there are approximately 2 millions speakers.
With the knowledge that, theoretically, everybody would learn the language, he ensured that it was easy to learn and understand.
Characteristics of Esperanto
- Every letter of the alphabet represents a sound. He hoped that word pronunciation would stay consistent as a result.
- Words can be created by using basic root words, prefixes, suffixes and the adequate word class. The word class indicates the type of word (ie noun, adjective, infinitive, adverbs, object, plural, past, future, conditional, command)
- There is only 1 definite article (la)
- There is an accent on the penultimate syllable in a word
Let’s take an example...
San (health-related = root) + o (word class = noun) = Sano (health)
San + a (word class = adjective) = Sana (healthy)
Most Esperanto root words come from Romance or Germanic origins. By learning 3000 of these root words, you can create around 20,000 words. This is approximately the number of words a native English speaker knows.
Why learn it?
Studies show that Esperanto is somewhere between 10 and 15 times quicker to learn than most European languages. Even if Esperanto is not widely spoken, I believe it should be taught in schools because it enables children to learn about the building blocks of language facilitating future foreign language acquisition.
Research has shown that if a child was to learn Esperanto for two years before then starting to learn a foreign language for another 3 years, they would have a higher competency in the second language than someone who had learnt the same language for 5 consecutive years. This suggests that learning Esperanto makes students more capable language learners. Perhaps then, we should consider teaching Esperanto at primary schools prior to the introduction of a modern foreign language, such as French or Spanish.
If you are interested in learning Esperanto, have a look a this website https://lernu.net/en/kurso/nakamura
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