Subject: Using resources: Esperanto's methods of supporting its community

From: Bob LeChevalier-Logical Language Group <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 21 Aug 2001 14:52:07 -0400

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" <[email-masked]>
>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)" <[email-masked]>
> >>Subject: Using resources
> >>Date: Sat, 18 Aug 2001 01:03:06 -0400
> >>
> >>>From: James Chandler <[email-masked]>
> >>>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
>
>Branæetoj nudaj
>Antaý æiel' lazura
>Lunon a¼uras.
>
>Se vi seræas...
> 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 [email-masked]
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