From lojbab@lojban.org Tue Aug 21 11:57:56 2001 Return-Path: X-Sender: lojbab@lojban.org X-Apparently-To: lojban@yahoogroups.com Received: (EGP: mail-7_3_1); 21 Aug 2001 18:57:56 -0000 Received: (qmail 10758 invoked from network); 21 Aug 2001 18:53:59 -0000 Received: from unknown (10.1.10.142) by l7.egroups.com with QMQP; 21 Aug 2001 18:53:59 -0000 Received: from unknown (HELO stmpy-2.cais.net) (205.252.14.72) by mta3 with SMTP; 21 Aug 2001 18:53:58 -0000 Received: from user.lojban.org (187.dynamic.cais.com [207.226.56.187]) by stmpy-2.cais.net (8.11.1/8.11.1) with ESMTP id f7LIrrX26821 for ; Tue, 21 Aug 2001 14:53:53 -0400 (EDT) Message-Id: <4.3.2.7.2.20010821144910.00be0a80@pop.cais.com> X-Sender: vir1036@pop.cais.com (Unverified) X-Mailer: QUALCOMM Windows Eudora Version 4.3.2 Date: Tue, 21 Aug 2001 14:52:07 -0400 To: lojban@yahoogroups.com Subject: Using resources: Esperanto's methods of supporting its community Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1"; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit From: Bob LeChevalier-Logical Language Group Something I posted in a thread on the Auxlang list (quoted in the text below) prompted a lengthy response from Don Harlow telling about the kids of things that the Esperanto community is doing. I thought it was interesting to compare with what LLG and various volunteers are doing with Lojban, and so I share his response with the list. lojbab >From: "Donald J. HARLOW" >Subject: Re: Using resources > >Je 07:14 atm 8/19/01 +0000, James CHANDLER skribis > > >Certainly some people will be attracted to the idea of learning an IAL by > >the possibilities for communication with other speakers of the language. > >However, i seriously doubt whether this strategy will ever succeed in > >spreading an IAL beyond 'club' level. The problem is simply this: even if > >there were many millions, or tens of millions of Esp speakers, the chances > >of me finding myself in a foren land, where i do not speak the native > >tongue, and finding that i can use Esp to communicate with anyone there are > >negligible. This will simply never work as a practical incentive to learn > >an IAL. > >James, you overlook two fundamental points here: > >(1) Communication does _not_ consist _only_ of face-to-face vocal >intercourse, as this list (of whose posters I myself have, in my life, only >ever communicated face-to-face with one); > >(2) The possibility of networking. > >I myself have encountered Esperanto speakers on the street, but rarely -- >the term "negligible" is probably legitimate here. (*) On the other hand, >I've found Esperanto to be _very_ useful when traveling (in countries, e.g. >China, where I don't know the language) simply because, at the current >time, it is possible to network successfully with other Esperanto speakers >(e.g., with pen-pals, through "Pasporta Servo", through the UEA Delegate >Network, etc.). To many people, this _is_ an attraction of the language. (**) > >(I should add -- though the case may be rare -- the letter-to-the-editor >that was published in Esperanto USA a decade ago by the guy who decided to >learn Esperanto after a trip through Europe during which he was stopped on >the street at least -- if memory serves -- five times in three different >countries by people who wanted to know if he could speak Esperanto with them.) > > >The only way to break thru the barrier is therefore to find someone who will > >start to get the IAL taught on a wide scale, to children or adults. In > >short, you need sponsorship by a state or a large organization with the > >resources to propel the language forward. If Espists think they are going > >to make Esp a universal language by expansion of the club network, they are > >at the very least going to have a very very long time to wait for this to > >come to fruition. They need to find a way now to short-circuit the process > >and find some _sponsors_ for the language. Without them, Esp is doomed to > >permanent stagnation. > >"Desuprismo" vs. "desubismo". This is, of course, a chicken-or-egg >conundrum; without the very large number of speakers, or at least >supporters, already developed through grass-roots action, you simply aren't >going to find such a sponsor. Luckily, Esperanto already has (and is the >_only_ planned language that has) enough such grass-roots-level clout to at >least _interest_ some _potential_ sponsors -- and, for the same reason, >enough appropriate human resources to work on developing that interest. > >"Stagnation", of course, is a question of perception -- often on the part >of those who neither have nor want genuine information about the current >situation. > > >And this is where the language itself comes in. Esp cannot stay forever an > >abstract idea in the minds of those who might come to its aid. No > >organization worth its salt is going to support the teaching of a language > >without first ensuring its quality and suitability for the task. Sooner or > >later, people are going to have to come face to face with the language > >itself, warts and all. And what worries me is that at this point the form > >of the language may jeopardize its chances for serious sponsorship. > >Cow pancakes. Even if Esperanto _had_ all the "warts and all" that you >think it does (and that many other people do _not_ think it does), well, >English, which is far worse, is taught all over the world. If a perfect >language were possible and created, it would not be taught without (a) >interest from its potential clientele and (b) political clout. Nobody, >deciding whether or not to support teaching of an IAL, is going to base >their decision on whether the infinitive is formed with an -I or an -AR, or >whether the noun plural is agglutinated or inflected; such decisions will >be based on interest and pressure. > >James was answering lojbab's e-mail on the same topic, to which I myself >will address a comment or two. Thanks for kind words, by the way, Bob. > > >>From: "Bob LeChevalier (lojbab)" > >>Subject: Using resources > >>Date: Sat, 18 Aug 2001 01:03:06 -0400 > >> > >>>From: James Chandler > >>>Subject: Re: Fwd: n-ro 131 - Gazetaraj komunikoj de UEA > >>> > >>>Ken > >>> > >>>You say the Espists will do what they can. This is something i could > >>>understand coming from an idist. After all, idists have only a modest, > >>>one > >>>might even say small movement, the level of organization does not approach > >>>that of the Esp movement, there is very little in the way of financial > >>>resources. > >> > >>While relatively speaking the Esperanto movement is better off than the Ido > >>movement, I suspect that they also have little in the way of financial > >>resources in the amounts needed to make an impact today. > >To answer James's comment, the Esperantists (like the Idists, like the >members of the government of the United States) will do "what they can" -- >and, perhaps, a bit more. (Actually, the Esperanto movement -- and perhaps >the Ido movement -- seems to be financially better off than the UN today, >which, I gather, is currently operating "in the red".) > > >>> In the last four years, since i have been involved, the efforts > >>>of idists have consisted mainly in trying to exploit the new possibilities > >>>afforded by the internet, as a cost-effective way of reaching a wider > >>>audience than was ever possible before. > >> > >>Which is a good description of what the Esperantists, the Occidentalists, > >>probably the Interlinguists, the Klingons, and the Lojbanists have also > >>been doing. > >The question of course being -- is that _all_ that they've been doing? >There are many other fields of endeavor as well. Can't answer for the >others, but the Esperantists have been doing quite a number of other >things. For instance, the last three lessons of the fifteen-lesson video >course "Esperanto: Pasporto al la tuta mondo" are now in post-production. I >don't know how well the twelve lessons that already exist are doing, except >that the Flandra Esperanto-Ligo, which produces and markets the PAL version >(the original, created here in the USA, is NTSC), last month had it up in >the top ten best-selling items in their book service (latest issue of >"Monato"). > > >>>However, coming from an espist, your response seems unambitious, not to > >>>say > >>>even slightly pathetic. Presumably the point of building up the Esp > >>>movement to its current level was to use it as a base to try and finally > >>>get > >>>the language into wider use. > >> > >>I would have the thought that the point of having a greater level of > >>interest in one's language is to make it more likely that you will have > >>someone to communicate with in the language meaningfully. I daresay that > >>the largest percentage of speakers of any of the artificial languages are > >>not so much interested in a "movement" so much as they are in with using > >>the language or in some cases with reforming it. > > From my point of view, the advantage to having more speakers in a language >is not to create a base from which to "take off" -- I have no idea how many >speakers that would take! -- but in increasing the services available to >speakers, something which is, to some degree, dependent on the number of >persons out there who can both provide and utilize such services. For >instance, this year (or was it last year?) "Pasporta Servo" -- not to be >confused with the videotape course mentioned above; PS is a hosting system, >like "Servas" (which name, incidentally, comes from Esperanto itself) -- >topped 1,000 hosts for the first time. These are people who offer free >lodgings to Esperanto-speaking travelers. The more hosts, of course, the >more useful the service is, and the more people who will be encouraged to >use it. > >"The journey of a thousand miles," the Chinese say, "begins with a single >step." They don't add that the rest of the journey consists of putting one >foot in front of the other, over and over again, a million times. The >operation is not very impressive. The result will be. James, of course, is >waiting for the Esperanto movement to put on its Seven-League Boots. Sadly, >there are none. > > >>>To be sitting on all that organization, > >> > >>And just how big is "all that organization", and how organized is it? If > >>the organizations have so many as 50,000 members, and they each pay $20 a > >>year, half of which goes to pay for a newsletter, the "movement" has a half > >>million dollars income worldwide. While this sounds like a lot to us small > >>fish, I doubt if that much money can do much more than finance book > >>publishing and provide some support for the large numbers of third world > >>Esperantists who could never afford $20/year. > >The former is generally funded not by dues but by sales (though often >without much of a profit). Some organizations _do_ support the latter use >of dues, though also they often ask for additional donations for this. >(UEA's dues are $50-$60 a year, half that for the third world, and they >have special funds set aside for third-world Esperanto speakers who are >active in the Esperanto movement.) > >Donations and legacies are a _big_ part of funding, if you can get them >(again, this requires a fairly large number of supporters / speakers in >place). The Esperantic Studies Foundation in the United States inherited >two million dollars a couple of years ago. The Japanese Esperanto Institute >and UEA were each given close to a million dollars, a year or so ago, by a >wealthy Japanese Esperanto speaker. Most of ELNA's current capital base >derives from the sale of a single house, willed to the organization back in >the eighties by a member (this was on the Peninsula south of San >Francisco); dues income, not counting the cost of free services provided to >members (the newsletter), barely serves to pay the annual salary of one of >the two individuals who works full-time in the ELNA central office. > >And, of course, there are donations in kind whose value cannot be >calculated. I pay $30 a month for my web site at Best; most of it is >devoted to making Esperanto literature available to those who can best >profit from it (including users of other planned languages -- three days >ago I got a nice e-mail, with suggested corrections of uncaught scanning >errors in a certain pair of files, from an Idist). I rarely, if ever, >donate cash to anybody, including Esperanto organizations (though there are >at least three book services and any number of publishers who have made at >least a little bit of profit from me); but I would expect that, if anybody >ever got around to calculating such "invisible" donations, I would be >providing at least $150-$200 per year through that web site. (James, I am >sure, could make a similar calculation for the IAL movement in general.) > >As far as "organization" is concerned, let me just quote from Renato >Corsetti's closing speech at the World Esperanto Congress in Zagreb less >than a month ago (Dankon, Renato!)(: > >"Mi volas diri, ke la Esperanto-movado ne multe similas al burokrata >organizajxo aux al regula armeo. Gxi multe pli similas al pirata bando. Oni >devas regajni sian rangon cxiutage denove sur la kampo. La estro estas tiu, >kiu unue saltas sur la malamikan sxipon. Kiam vi ne saltas unue, vi ne plu >estas la estro." > >(I want to say that the Esperanto movement is not very similar to a >bureaucratic organization or a regular army. It much more closely resembles >a gang of pirates. You have to win back your rank, every day, in the field. >The leader is the one who first jumps onto the enemy ship. When you don't >jump first, you are no longer in charge.) > > >>I haven't seen recent numbers from Don, but my recollection was that ELNA > >>had maybe 1000 subscribing members which is less than 10 times what we > >>Lojbanists have (if we were actively publishing our journal that they are > >>subscribing to). > >At the moment, fewer than that, actually. The figures vary from year to >year, going up and down, though the general long-term trend is up. ELNA >started out without about 100-200 members in the 1950s. When I worked in >its central office, the average annual membership was around 500. There was >a spike to around 1100 at the beginning of the last decade (apparently the >result of a lot of free publicity because of the Esperanto centennial in >1887 -- articles in Time magazine, the Smithsonian, etc.). The current >plateau appears to be about halfway in between that of the early eighties >and the 1990 spike. Next step? > > >>>and presumably not insignificant financial resources, > >> > >>A million dollars is a lot to an individual, but minuscule on the scale of > >>a single country, much less for a worldwide enterprise. Those conferences > >>probably chew up a large portion of that each time they are held (though > >>such conventions may generate some income to partially or wholly cover > >>their costs). > >Can't answer for the World Esperanto Congress, but ELNA's annual congress >is expected to turn a "profit" (i.e., money to be shared between the >sponsoring local organization or group and ELNA's capital fund -- actually, >ELNA is a "not-for-profit" organization). On a more local scale, the >relatively large 1999 (about 70 people) and considerably smaller 2000 >(about 30 people) California Esperanto Conference both provided nice little >nest eggs for the organizing groups. > > >>>and then > >>>to simply shrug ones shoulders and say 'well do what we can' seems odd in > >>>the extreme. Surely there must be more one can do with the organization > >>>that has been so painstakingly built up. > >> > >>Such as? It sounds like it is everything that they can do to even convene > >>that organization for the various conferences that people joke about. > >There are actually plenty of things that can be, and are, done by such >organizations. The problem is that most of them are relatively invisible at >the time; they involve establishing an infrastructure, getting oneself >brought to the attention of various organizations, etc. And, of course, >there are always those who would prefer _not_ to know what is being done, >in order to be able to criticize such organizations for doing nothing. Let >us overlook, for instance, UEA's role in the "Indighenaj Dialogoj" program, >its ongoing representation and interventions at UNESCO and the UN, the role >it has been playing over the last couple of years (both organizationally, >contact-wise, and in the production of materials) in the at-last spread of >Esperanto into the Arabic-speaking world, its publishing program (yesterday >I found out that UEA itself has just published the Esperanto version of >Marco Polo's "Book of Wonders"), its role in organizations consisting of >various NGOs, etc., etc., ad tedium and -- I suspect to some -- ad nauseam. > > >>>At this point, i think, much > >>>depends on the language itself. With a large organization you can take > >>>the > >>>language out to people and confront them with it. > >> > >>You mean the 10 postal lessons? Even that is probably difficult to support > >>worldwide with the current level of Esperanto activity. > >Seems to be working. There were -- last time I looked -- six or seven >different versions out there being taught (English, French, German, >Italian, Chinese, Portuguese, Spanish -- Italian?). But the ten-lesson >course is not, after all, very much a product of organizations; it's >advertised, distributed, and taught by volunteers. Even the paper course, >which is made available through ELNA, gets diverted immediately into >volunteer hands once ELNA has sent out the first lesson; and there are any >number of instructors -- I don't know their numbers -- who simply get lots >of copies of that first lesson, put their own address on it, and set it out >for distribution themselves, without referring to ELNA in any way. > >As to "taking the language out to people and confronting them with it" -- >no Esperanto organization at the level higher than local is really in a >position to do that. The best that UEA and ELNA can do is provide logistic >support for those individuals and local groups that _do_ present the >language to the people. Granted, they don't always do an outstanding job of >that. But the venues in which they operate almost _demand_ other approaches >to the question. UEA, for instance, is not organized to teach Esperanto >courses in Rotterdam (well, at least not with _my_ dues); it _is_ organized >to keep the language visible at UNESCO and the UN, for instance. > > >>>With a really well-designed language, you can leverage the organization to > >>>start to really get people interested in it. If, on the other hand, > >>>people > >>>can see straight away that the scheme has not been thought out properly, > >>>the > >>>organization will be of little use in taking the language to the next > >>>stage. > >> > >>I don't think that language design is a significant issue in getting people > >>interested or not. The bottom line is getting people to see that investing > >>their time in learning the language is worth that time. The Esperantists > >>try to make it worthwhile by providing things for people to read and write, > >>and to get people to use the language. They seem to do this better than > >>any of the rest of us. > >Again, if people are willing to learn English, given James's argument far >more should be willing to learn Esperanto. That this is not the case is, I >think, proof -- if any were needed -- that nobody cares much about the >_design_ (or, in the case of English, lack thereof) of a language, but >about its _utility_ -- and to them, not in any sort of theoretical terms. >English is perceived as being of great use; Esperanto is perceived (more or >less correctly) as being of relatively little use. That the design of >Esperanto, whatever its "warts and all", is far superior to that of English >is irrelevant. > >--- > >(*) The gods alone know how many I've _passed_ on the street without >knowing that they spoke Esperanto. This, of course, is a fundamental >problem with this approach -- the ability to speak Esperanto is not >demonstrated for all to see by a halo around the brow or some similar >visual phenomenon. Lest anyone mention the canonical green star, I will >point out that today relatively few Esperanto speakers -- and I'm not one >of them -- wear one in public ... > >(**) The financial aspects of this should be obvious. Among the people I >know personally here in the Bay Area, both Joel B. and Amanda H. have >traveled, on a shoestring, for _months_ in Europe and elsewhere using this >sort of networking (in Joel's case, for three years!). After the World >Esperanto Congress in Beijing, Martin P. estimated to me that he saved >between three and six thousand dollars in hotel bills by taking advantage >of lodging opportunities among Esperanto speakers in East Asia for a couple >of months' extra stay in the region. Ed W. and Sandy T. were able to spend >a month traveling in Europe before the 1987 World Esperanto Congress in >Warsaw because they could take advantage of the Pasporta Servo. And, in a >slightly different way, I got my air fare paid to Beijing -- and back -- by >spending a week as an escort for a multinational group of >Esperanto-speaking tourists in Jiangsu Province (_not_, understand, as a >_guide_ -- we had two local ladies, both Esperanto speakers, taking care of >that part for us, as well as local Esperanto speakers and organizations in >Yangzhou, Nanjing, Suzhou and Shanghai). > > >-- Don HARLOW >http://www.webcom.com/~donh/don/don.html > >Branĉetoj nudaj >Antaŭ ĉiel' lazura >Lunon aĵuras. > >Se vi serĉas... > Novelojn, http://www.best.com/~donh/Esperanto/Literaturo/Noveloj/ > Poemojn, http://www.best.com/~donh/Esperanto/Literaturo/Poezio/ > Recenzojn, http://www.best.com/~donh/Esperanto/Literaturo/Recenzoj/ -- lojbab lojbab@lojban.org Bob LeChevalier, President, The Logical Language Group, Inc. 2904 Beau Lane, Fairfax VA 22031-1303 USA 703-385-0273 Artificial language Loglan/Lojban: http://www.lojban.org