Re: [lojban] Re: Towards Lojban for Beginners version 2.0

[Adam Chevalier <chevalieradam2@gmail.com>]

On Friday, February 22, 2013 6:59:53 PM UTC-6, lojbab wrote:
> Adam Chevalier wrote:
> > I had considered making my own version of L4B to take care of some
> > things that, personally, put me off.
> > There were a couple of Excercises that were "gotchas" and you don't want
> > those in learning material for beginners
> > (Mistranslating taipei under the auspices of "a b sounds like a p in the
> > local orthography" is a terrible excuse and it made it sound like Robin
> > was showing off)
>
>  > Of course, by reading this board for several months I know it wasn't
>  > intentional.
>
>
> Actually, LFB was written by Nick Nicolas and Robin Turner, and the 
> example may have been used intentionally with international students 
> (who probably know English well enough to use LFB) in mind, rather than 
> to "show off".  The point is that the English pronunciation of foreign 
> names is often NOT a legitimate basis for Lojbanizing that name.  You 
> want the native/local pronunciation if possible.

That isn't my point. taibei, as a lojbanized name, isn't how its pronounced locally or in English.

If there intention was to teach that lesson, important as it is, they should have used a proper example.

 

> > Some other recommendations:
> >
> > 1) Try not to emphasize the concept of malglico so much.
>
> Absolutely, one should do so.  Lojban is NOT encoded English, and if one 
> gets lazy, one will not be understood  (or will be intentionally 
> misunderstood by some people who are literal-minded and don't like 
> malglico).

I don't remember stating that Lojban was encoded English, or even implying it.

But the seeming emphasis on malglico can come across as insulting, especially with gotchas like ninmu.

 

> > You /have/ to
> > explain lojban in English terms in order to teach it to an English
> > audience, so translating ninmu to x1 is a woman and scolding the learner
> > for assuming it means an adult isn't right (by the way, we have a word
> > for ninmu, its called female).
>
> No. fetsi is the word for female, but is not limited to human(oid)s. 
> ninmu is a female human(oid) being, not necessarily adult. nixli is 
> expressly a girl (immature ninmu).  The definition of ninmu in the gismu 
> list specifically says that it is not necessarily an adult, so a learner 
> who assumes contrary to that definition probably deserves "scolding" 
> (though preferably in a gentle, constructive tone).

It doesn't matter whats in the gismu list, we are talking about LFB.

LFB specifically translates it as x1 is a woman. If you are going to translate it to English improperly you cannot scold them for misunderstanding.

The proper translation for ninmu, based on those gismu you just gave me, is x1 is a female humanoid.

 

> > 2) Find ways to explain the concepts without resorting to "If you're a
> > Mathematician, computer programmer, or a logician, its like these things."
>
> For some things derived from formal systems, like lambda calculus, I 
> suspect that it is difficult to manage this, but good luck.

I'm not talking about lambda calculus, i'm talking about predicate logic.

Saying "For programmers, its like a parameter." And then just drop it for everyone else.

That is all I'm getting at. I'd like to see Lojban expand beyond hobbyists and people in Math related fields.

 

> > 3) Concepts and words related to language studies are confusing, please
> > give some kind of definition for these concepts.
>
> Technical terminology will often be opaque to someone not trained in the 
> relevant field.  I was confused about grammar terms for years including 
> the first couple of years AFTER I started separating Lojban from TLI 
> Loglan.  And even worse, sometimes technical terms have different 
> meanings in colloquial English (e.g. the classic misuse of "theory" by 
> creationists).  The latter is why I went to using the Lojban words 
> untranslated.  There really is no English translation of tanru that does 
> the concept justice.

I'm not talking about gismu, and tanru, and jbo'ivla. I'm talking about meta-linguistic terms.

Words about language that are thrown around that beginners are not likely to understand.

 

> >     Anyway, what do you think, should we start updating it to reflect
> >     the latest improvements to the grammar and the way lojban should be
> >     taught?
>
> The only approved change to the grammar is xorlo.
>
> And there is no agreement on how Lojban "should be" taught.
>
> I happen to like the way that Russian-written textbooks teach Russian, 
> but it is considerably different from how American-written textbooks do 
> so.  Each is tailored to a certain style of teaching and a certain 
> audience.  "better" requires that you fill in ALL the places of xamgu, 
> including the standard.  "correct" (drani), is even tougher; it also has 
> property and situation places besides the standard.
>
> If someone wants to write a new intro textbook that embodies their own 
> ideas for teaching the language, then go ahead and do so.  But write it 
> anew rather than "updating" what doesn't need an "update", and call it 
> something different.  Unlike CLL, which is part of the formal language 
> definition, beginning textbooks need not all be written to the same 
> standard.
>
> lojbab

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