# Esperanto? Why not sign language as a universal language? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [January 12, 2006, 2:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/esperanto-why-not-sign-language-as-a-universal-language/339608 "2006-01-12T02:19:11Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 7\ **Page:** 7
**Author:** ![Sunspace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sunspace/32/1250_2.png) [@Sunspace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sunspace)\ **Post date:** [January 18, 2006, 9:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/esperanto-why-not-sign-language-as-a-universal-language/339608/121 "2006-01-18T21:17:16Z")
> [@Excalibre](#): > > That’s a major fuck-up if he didn’t even _intend_ that. I don’t mean that I should be able to instantly comprehend a sentence in Esperanto (though if he had chosen bases of words more carefully, a polyglot like myself might have been able to do so.) He intended the language to be more easily learnable than existing national languages, not that it be comprehensible with no introduction. “Natually readable [to a reader knowing a language with Romance roots] without any rules”? I’m not sure that’s possible. The easier a language is to comprehend without training, the closer it would seem to be to one you already know, it would seem to me. Zamenhof published a basic grammar guide on a sheet of paper, and provided a basic vocabulary list for the beginner. (There was also translated and original literature). It is possible to learn to _write_ the language, with help of a dictionary, from these. I know people who have done it. Following this, there’s a basic written ten-lesson course available by post or over the net, and then other books and learning materials. Of course, gaining fluency in speaking and hearing it is another matter, and for this you do need other speakers, especially if you were previously effectively monolingual, like me. > [@](#): > > The problem I’m getting at is that the orthography is oddly complicated, and not at all transparent. I have no idea how to pronounce many Esperanto words. It is pretty much phonetic. > [@](#): > > A well-designed auxiliary language would be set up so that those who don’t speak it could at least do reasonably at reading a text aloud and pronouncing it approximately right; it’s hard to imagine how Esperanto could be worse in that respect. The ridiculous choice to use diacritics - and bizarre ones at that (circumflexes on consonants? Didn’t he think about people trying to use typewriters?!) worsens the situation. Well, isn’t his orthography closer to Polish/Russian/Eastern European than Western European? No surprise, given where he came from. I don’t know about the choice of carets over the consonants, though; I suppose he could have used haceks and been in line with Czech usage. I seem to recall that Janton (there’s that source again–I really have to ask for my book back) mentions that the u-shaped accent (breve?) over the U follows Byelorussian practice. Again, if true, not a surprise. I’ve seen a lot of older typewritten stuff from this side of the pond with the diacritics written in by hand. Of course, today, with computers and word processors, it’s easier to get diacritics. There are a number of variant ways to spell it with no diacritics. One version (the ‘h-method’) uses the letter h after the non-diacriticked consonant to indicate the diacriticked consonant: gh = ĝ, and so on for the others. This is what Zamenhof officially reccommended. The other main method uses an x insted of an h: gx = ĝ. This has the advantage that x is not otherwise a letter in the Esperanto alphabet, and so it avoids certain spelling ambiguities with words that have the letters gh, instead of ĝ, for example. This method spread with the internet and seems now to be the most common. Me, when I scribble it by hand, I just use straight lines for every diacritic. 🙂 > [@](#): > > No argument, but the roots he chooses are ironically often ones that _haven’t_ established themselves in international vocabulary. _Suno_ instead of, say, _solo_ for the sun. Why use the English word when more people would recognize the Romance root? Because _sol_ is the root for ‘lonely’ or ‘alone’: _sola_ = alone (adjective); _sole_ = singly (adverb). He tried to avoid having root forms with more than one meaning, and had to make sure that they differed. ---
**Author:** ![Excalibre](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/898d66/32.png) [@Excalibre](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Excalibre)\ **Post date:** [January 18, 2006, 9:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/esperanto-why-not-sign-language-as-a-universal-language/339608/122 "2006-01-18T21:59:03Z")
> [@Sunspace](#): > > Zamenhof published a basic grammar guide on a sheet of paper, and provided a basic vocabulary list for the beginner. The “Sixteen Rules”? People more acquainted with the language than me have pointed out that the Sixteen Rules presuppose a lot of things; for instance, they don’t describe syntax thoroughly, and speakers of non-European languages have far less luck with them. Esperanto probably _does_ seem easy to native speakers of European languages, but that’s because it’s so similar to them, not because it’s so well-designed. That makes it much less useful as an international language. > [@](#): > > It is pretty much phonetic. No, it’s not. Leaving aside the issue of what “phonetic” means (no writing system - no usable one, at least, is “phonetic”), it’s extremely unclear. And it doesn’t have to be. It makes bizarre choices for its use of symbols. > [@](#): > > I don’t know about the choice of carets over the consonants, though; I suppose he could have used haceks and been in line with Czech usage. I seem to recall that Janton (there’s that source again–I really have to ask for my book back) mentions that the u-shaped accent (breve?) over the U follows Byelorussian practice. Again, if true, not a surprise. Right. But it’s a bad choice either way; using strange diacritics means - in the computer age - that encodings have to specifically be designed to include the bizarre Esperanto characters. Before this, of course, it meant that you pretty much couldn’t type it. It’s a minor issue to be sure, but it’s such a _simple_ one - there’s absolutely no reason for a designed language to use diacritics; it’s a stupid choice because it makes reading and writing that much more complicated. > [@](#): > > Because _sol_ is the root for ‘lonely’ or ‘alone’: _sola_ = alone (adjective); _sole_ = singly (adverb). He tried to avoid having root forms with more than one meaning, and had to make sure that they differed. But he didn’t do that when designing the derivation system. Thus, _filino_ might mean “dirty linens” (“shameful flax”, more literally) or “daughter”. ---
**Author:** ![yBeayf](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/e274bd/32.png) [@yBeayf](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/yBeayf)\ **Post date:** [January 18, 2006, 10:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/esperanto-why-not-sign-language-as-a-universal-language/339608/123 "2006-01-18T22:09:10Z")
> [@](#): > > Well, isn’t his orthography closer to Polish/Russian/Eastern European than Western European? No, it’s not. Not even close. It’s off in its own little world. ---
**Author:** ![Sunspace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sunspace/32/1250_2.png) [@Sunspace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sunspace)\ **Post date:** [January 18, 2006, 10:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/esperanto-why-not-sign-language-as-a-universal-language/339608/124 "2006-01-18T22:12:58Z")
> [@Excalibre](#): > > The “Sixteen Rules”? People more acquainted with the language than me have pointed out that the Sixteen Rules presuppose a lot of things; for instance, they don’t describe syntax thoroughly, and speakers of non-European languages have far less luck with them. Esperanto probably _does_ seem easy to native speakers of European languages, but that’s because it’s so similar to them, not because it’s so well-designed. That makes it much less useful as an international language. Not knowing any non-European languages, I cannot judge this. I’ll ask my Korean Esperanto-speaking friends. > [@](#): > > Right. But it’s a bad choice either way; using strange diacritics means - in the computer age - that encodings have to specifically be designed to include the bizarre Esperanto characters. Before this, of course, it meant that you pretty much couldn’t type it. It’s a minor issue to be sure, but it’s such a _simple_ one - there’s absolutely no reason for a designed language to use diacritics; it’s a stupid choice because it makes reading and writing that much more complicated. Ultimately, I have to agree with you there. The existence of things such as the x-method shows that there are improvements to be made. > [@](#): > > But he didn’t do that when designing the derivation system. Thus, _filino_ might mean “dirty linens” (“shameful flax”, more literally) or “daughter”. And thus we enter the world of the Esperanto pun. _Teamo_ = team, or love of tea. Someone joked that _nanc_ might mean ‘uncorrupt financial’, if _financ_ meant ‘financial’… ---
**Author:** ![Monty](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/monty/32/47_2.png) [@Monty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Monty)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2006, 7:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/esperanto-why-not-sign-language-as-a-universal-language/339608/125 "2006-01-21T07:32:36Z")
Apropos of not much, on pages 65 to 68 of the February 2006 issue of _Games_ magazizne is a description of a new card game. The game is name _Porcio_ (Esperanto for “portion”) and also uses another Esperanto term. I haven’t played it but the game looks enough like Bridge _and_ enough different from Bridge to interest me. ---
**Author:** ![Fiddle\_Peghead](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fiddle_peghead/32/3506_2.png) [@Fiddle\_Peghead](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fiddle_Peghead)\ **Post date:** [July 26, 2012, 2:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/esperanto-why-not-sign-language-as-a-universal-language/339608/126 "2012-07-26T14:05:05Z")
> [@Monty](#): > > Apropos of not much, on pages 65 to 68 of the February 2006 issue of _Games_ magazizne is a description of a new card game. The game is name _Porcio_ (Esperanto for “portion”) and also uses another Esperanto term. > > I haven’t played it but the game looks enough like Bridge _and_ enough different from Bridge to interest me. Did you ever play this game? A classmate of mine created it and I was just curious what you thought of it. ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [July 26, 2012, 2:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/esperanto-why-not-sign-language-as-a-universal-language/339608/127 "2012-07-26T14:08:28Z")
Please note that the posts before **Fiddle Peghead** ’s are from January 2006. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/esperanto-why-not-sign-language-as-a-universal-language/339608.md?page=6)