Re: [lojban] ma krinu lonu lo jbopre na tavla fo la.lojban. ne'i levi snustu | Why aren't we speaking in Lojban in here?

[Stela Selckiku <selckiku@gmail.com>]

On Tue, Aug 31, 2010 at 3:04 AM, Jonathan Jones <eyeonus@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> There are the IRC rooms as well, which are also for Lojbanic discussions.
> Every time I am (infrequently) on IRC, I see either no active discussions,
> or I see active discussions about Lojban being held in English.


.i za'a lo nu tavla fo la .lojban. ve cu'u la .irc. cu cafne .i'e .i
lo nu glico tavla cu zmadu .ie fi lo ka cafne kei ki'u lo za'i so'i
nintadni .e so'i za'e cimnynintadni (to zoi zoi eternaj komencantoj
zoi toi) cu jundi .i ku'i ji'a so'i jbobau nu casnu cu fasnu za'a

ni'o ko ve cu'u la .irc. tavla fo la .lojban. .i lakne fa lo nu lo
jbopre cu jbobau spuda


> I very occasionally see discussions being held in Lojban in a group thread,
> but these threads almost always die out rather quickly, with my guess to the
> cause being the lack of interest in reading something that needs to be
> translated before it can be understood. I admit to having been guilty of
> this myself.


I think the problem is not just that there's few people who speak
proficiently, but also that the people who can speak are at all
different levels of fluency.  There are a very few people who can
manage complicated conversations on a wide variety of topics: Gejyspa,
Xorxes, Pierre, etc.  They can and do have occasional conversations
here, and they stay in Lojban even for instance in metadiscussions of
each other's grammar and choice of words.  The only problem is that
once the conversation has been taken to that level, everyone else is
unintentionally squeezed out.  I've myself only recently gotten to the
point where I can comfortably read the most advanced conversations
here, so I'm very familiar with the feeling: "Oh great, a conversation
in Lojban!  Oh my, an entire complicated paragraph in Lojban.  Oh god,
my head, it hurts!  Oh well, maybe I'd be able to respond to this once
I practice more."

I do think there are things we could do to lessen this problem.  I try
to speak as simply as possible when posting Lojban to the list, to
broaden the possible audience of what I say.  One suggestion I've been
making forever, but that no one has ever taken up, is that when
talking casually to a general audience we should use the long form for
all but the most basic of lujvo.  That is instead of "zdacne" we could
say "zdanycenba".  I was able to process "zdacne" when I read it on
this list recently-- I know "zda" like the back of my hand, and I
could guess "cne" in context after thinking for a second-- but I
remember well what a painful slog all those short lujvo are when
you're learning.  I think the main reason people can't bear to use the
long forms is aesthetics-- "zdacne" is a gorgeous word, and it's hard
to speak Lojban with big ugly easy words once you know how to use
those svelte classy ones.


> Now, obviously, I'm guilty of the very thing I'm ranting about right now
> with this message. My reasons for this are: I'm not currently proficient at
> Lojban, this is a very long rant, and I highly doubt anyone would bother
> reading this if it were in Lojban.


.i da'i mi tcidu .i mi tcidu so'i clani poi lo jbopre cu finti

ni'o do na kakne lo nu tavla fi lo pluja fo lo jbobau .i ku'i do kakne
lo nu tavla fi lo sampu .i ko sampu casnu .i casnu lo se lifri be do
.i na nitcu lo nu dukse pluja tavla troci


> If you actually read this entire thing, you have my gratitude. If you wish
> to respond, I would be very, very happy if you did so in Lojban. And if, in
> future, you see something written in Lojban, here in these groups or
> elsewhere, do us both a favour, and make your response be in the same
> language.


vi'o djica be lo nu jbotavla

There, I did it, I followed my own advice and forced myself to spell
out "tavla", even though "jbota'a" is so pretty. :>


I've had a thought forever to start a list called "djelisri",
day-stories.  I thought of the lujvo "djelisri" a long time ago (when
I was named "mungodjelis" from "mungojelly").  What it means is a
story you tell about your day, about what happened to you in the past
day and how you felt about it.

We wouldn't really need a different list, we could just start posting
our djelisri here, it would just require a little shift in the culture
here.  But I haven't been able to bring myself to just start randomly
posting all the time little rants about my life here.  It feels weird
somehow to go to this place where people are usually discussing
grammar and such and just start going, "I ate a banana!  It was a
yummy banana!  Then I went to the park!"

Maybe I should just get over that hesitancy and start inundating y'all
with stories of my park-going banana-eating?  Or maybe starting a new
forum could help us break the ice?  I'd be really interested in
anyone's opinion on that because I'm quite undecided.  I could be
talked into ranting more in Lojban in this forum if that would really
be appropriate.


mi'e la stela selckiku
mu'o

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