Archive for 'Esperanto Language'
Confusing “De” and “Da” Posted by Transparent Language on Mar 29, 2009
Esperanto has two similar prepositions, “de” and “da,” that mean two different things but are similar enough to trip up students of other languages. Having studied Spanish as my first excursion into foreign language, “de” and “da” manage to confuse me on occasion. We shall have a look at them here today. “De” roughly means…
Solresol Posted by Transparent Language on Mar 27, 2009
Esperanto was not the first attempt at a universal language. There were a few ill-fated ventures throughout history. Mostly, they had the right idea, but simply did not connect with the human mindset. My favorite example was Solresol, a curious language that used the seven notes of the musical scale. It came into existence a…
Almost at the U.N. Posted by Transparent Language on Mar 27, 2009
At two salient points in world history, Esperanto came within a fraction of a hair of being globally embraced. Unfortunately, neither of those instances proved fruitful for our favorite secondary language. However, it is worth noting that Esperanto comes closer and closer to worldwide recognition with each consecutive try – so we should be there…
The World’s Most Expressive Language Posted by Transparent Language on Mar 25, 2009
Some critics of Esperanto have scoffed at the idea that a man-made language could possibly convey feeling, emotion, or “soul.” Perhaps they think that vortoj can only mean something if they have evolved out of centuries of human usage; if their linguistic roots express a rich tradition of language and the culture that uses it…
Don’t Confuse These Infixes! Posted by Transparent Language on Mar 25, 2009
Sometimes you’ll encounter words in Esperanto have have the infixes “-ec-” or “-ecx-.” When written, they look almost the same at a glance. However, there’s a world of difference between the two of them, so be sure not to confuse them! The infix “-ec-” denotes a state of being, much like the English suffix “-ness.”…
Reading Esperanto Poetry Posted by Transparent Language on Mar 23, 2009
Most of Esperanto’s ease of use stems from its intuitive grammar coding rules. You can deduce a word’s part of speech based upon its ending letter. All nouns end in “-o,” all adjectives end in “-a,” and so on. Since poetry in any language often takes liberties with the rules of grammar, it is not…
Non-Intuitive Opposites Posted by Transparent Language on Mar 23, 2009
You can essentially double your Esperanto vocabulary simply by using the prefix “mal-.” Unlike in English “mal-” does not indicate negativity; it simply means that the word containing the prefix must be treated as its opposite. It does not work for nouns, necessarily – “malviro” does not mean “woman,” for example. You would use “malvarma”…