Advances in Social Science, Education and Humanities Research, volume 673

2022 3rd International Conference on Language, Art and Cultural Exchange (ICLACE 2022)

The Vitality of Esperanto: To be or Not to be?

Yutian Li1,*
1
Beijing Royal School, Beijing, 102209, China
*
Corresponding author. Email: [email protected]

ABSTRACT
Esperanto is a relatively ideal artificial language compared to others, for the reason that it fuses the characteristics of
languages from different countries, and is easy to learn. It has developed for more than a century. As a result, it has
formed a rigorous grammatical and lexical system. However, people are still debating whether Esperanto should
continue to exist. Some believe that Esperanto should be spread, while others think that it will become extinct in the
near future. This article discusses about the vitality of Esperanto by researching and providing examples of how it has
emerged and developed, as well as its grammatical and lexical features., which proves to those concerned that
Esperanto deserves worldwide publicity.

Keywords: Esperanto, languages, Artificial languages, Unification.

Advisory Relationship Department, which is meaningful

1. INTRODUCTION
for developing such an artificial language [2].
Esperanto can connect people of different countries,
races and cultures to communicate freely and fairly. It, 1.2. The Properties of Esperanto
to some extent, can help to avoid arguments between
nations, because it belongs to all people in the world. It Esperanto was created based on Indo-European
symbolizes the spirit of equality and peace, and is still languages, and has followed the advantages of this
vital today. system to simplify and standardize itself. Furthermore,
Zamenhof has made Esperanto a neutral, equal and
Serving as an international language that is easy to unambiguous language.
learn, Esperanto can make people of whatever nation,
whatever ethnic or race better understand each other, 1.2.1. Neutrality
which verifies the great importance of itself.
After Zamenhof announced the Esperanto plan, he
With its unique attributes of neutrality, equality and
has repeatedly stated that Esperanto belongs to all
unambiguousness, Esperanto deserves worldwide
mankind. It does not exclude or attempt to replace any
recognition, publicity and acceptance. In this essay, I
national language. From a linguistic point of view, it
would discuss why Esperanto is still vital and how it can
will not bring any language and cultural aggression, and
serve as the best choice of an global language.
will not have a negative impact on the national language
and culture of each country. It does not hurt people’s
1.1. The Origin of Esperanto rights to speak the language of their own culture, but
Esperanto is a language created in 1887 by just provides an international auxiliary language for
Zamenhof, a Polish linguist and doctor. It has been human beings to conduct international exchanges. E.g.
about 130 years from its first establishment to today, Esperanto has provided convenience for people from
and is still active in the modern world after suffering China and France to communicate, and, at the same time,
great strikes of World War I and II [1]. Today, they are free to keep using Mandarin and France in their
Esperanto Leagues are established in many countries, own countries. Esperanto has the characteristics of
including Korea, Japan, Iraq, Brazil, Argentina and neutrality.
Togo, etc. In 1954, the United Nations Education,
Science and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) granted
the International Esperanto League as a Level B

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 Advances in Social Science, Education and Humanities Research, volume 673

1.2.2. Equality 1.2.3. Unambiguousness

Esperanto has assimilated the advantages of many This includes two aspects: language consistency and
languages and represents a spirit of equality. It is simple form and meaning. A pronunciation corresponds to only
and easy to learn, and is more conducive to equal one spelling, a word has only one meaning, and there
exchanges between nations, for the reason that the are only a few polysemous words. For example, in
language is not used as an official language by any British English, "a set of rooms for living in that are part
nations, but is new for all its speakers. Though its of a larger building and are usually all on one floor"
vocabulary may seem European, its lexical composition refers to the word "flat"; while in American English that
and grammar are, in fact, highly international. E.g. is “apartment”, and flat only means "level and smooth,
generally speaking, the suffix -as is added after every with no curved, high, or hollow parts". But in Esperanto,
verb, while -o after every noun. Parts of speech can be "apartamento" means "apartment" and "glata" means
easily changed by altering the suffix of a word. This can "flat (adj.)" only. Generally speaking, one Esperanto
be understood by people all around the world. When word corresponds to one meaning only. Table 1 shows
using Esperanto, it feels more egalitarian from a how the same word in English, which have different
linguistic point of view than using any of the seven meanings, are expressed in Esperanto:
language families.
Table 1. A comparison between English polysemy words and the Esperanto translation of each meaning. Each
Esperanto word has only one corresponding meaning.
English Definition Esperanto
Fly (n.)A small insect with two wings Muŝo
(v.)Moves through the air Flugi
Match (n.)a short, thin stick made of wood or Alumeto
cardboard and covered with a special
chemical at one end that burns when
rubbed firmly against a rough surface
(v.)similar or look attractive together Parigi
sign (n.)a notice giving information, directions, a signo
warning, etc.
(v.)To write your name, usually on a written subscribi
or printed document, to show that you
agree with its contents or have written or
created it yourself

2. THE GRAMMAR OF ESPERANTO

Esperanto was born out of the Indo-European language family, and is easy to learn. Table 2 shows the Esperanto
alphabet:
Table 2. The Esperanto alphabet. 22 of them are based on Latin, while the other six are formed by adding diacritics.
Semi-
Vowels Consonants
vowels
Aa Bb Cc Ĉĉ Dd Ff Gg Ĝĝ Jj
Ee Hh Ĥĥ Ii Ĵĵ Kk Ll Mm Ŭŭ
Ii Nn Oo Pp Rr Ss Ŝŝ Tt
Oo Vv Zz
Uu

Esperanto has only 16 grammar rules. Such as: There is no indefinite article, only the definite article
la, which can be used for all genders, numbers, and
Verbs have no change of person and number; e.g. Mi
cases. e.g. La knabinoj (the girls), la koko (the chicken),
laboras (I work)/ Li laboras (He works)/ Ili laboras
la manĝo (the food);
(They work). In the present progressive tense, no matter
what the subject is, the verb is always laboras. Compound words are formed by simple
concatenation of words (the main word comes after) e.g.
Every preposition has a definite and unchanging
matenmanĝo (Breakfast=Morning – on + Eat).
meaning, e.g. Al (to), el (from), de (of), en (in), etc, and
cannot be mixed together;

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Each word is read and written in accord with its Esperanto. However, the problem with this letter is only
spelling. Each pronunciation has a fixed corresponding a trivial matter, far from affecting the vitality of
letter. After learning the rules of the twenty-eight letters, Esperanto itself - even if r is simply pronounced as l,
any word can be read and written. meanings can also be judged based on the text. Such as
flago (flag) and frago (strawberry): if someone says they
The stress of a word is always on the penultimate
want to hang a flago in the classroom, then people can
syllable, no matter how long the word is; e.g. For the
probably tell that they want to hang a flag, not a
word “viro” (man), the stress is on the syllable “vi”;
strawberry; similarly, if a person says they are hungry
While for the word “komencanto (beginner), the stress
and wants to eat fragoj, then people can also know that
is on “can”.
they want to eat strawberries.
The loan words only need to be written according to
the Esperanto orthography. When several different 4. The VITALITY OF ESPERANTO
words are derived from a single root, it is best to use the
basic word unchanged, and from this to construct other 4.1. The Development of Esperanto
words according to the rules of Esperanto. For example,
the word hundo comes from German (Meaning: Dog). Esperanto is now the most common man-made
In fact, "dog" in German is hund, but because most language in the world. According to incomplete
nouns end in o’s in Esperanto grammar, nothing except statistics, there are about 2 million Esperanto speakers
an o is added after the word. In the same way, the plural in the world [7]. There are Esperanto organizations and
form follows the grammar of Esperanto: Hundoj. Esperanto speakers in more than 120 countries and
regions around the world, especially in urban areas. This
These will save the learner a lot of time to master the
also shows that Esperanto has a certain influence on a
language[3].
global scale. Esperanto is especially popular in Eastern
Europe, Northern Europe, South Korea, Japan, and Iran
3. THE ACADEMIC DEBATE ON in Asia, Brazil, Argentina, Mexico in America, and
ESPERANTO Togo in Africa. Due to the development of technology,
more and more people started to use online learning
Although the language system of Esperanto is
channels to make themselves Esperantists, thus
relatively rigorous, it still has not become a mainstream
promoting the improvement of Esperanto and
language. At present, the whole world already has its
accelerating its worldwide popularity.
own independent language system, especially the two
dominant language families: the Indo-European Esperanto has always been alive. Thanks to its
language family and the Sino-Tibetan language family. constant evolution, Esperanto is continuously
They have acquired a more important position, so developing. An interesting example is that the Esperanto
everyone has long been accustomed to it, so many translation of "mouse (A small mammal with short fur, a
scholars believe that people would rather accept the pointed face, and a long tail) " is "Muso", which is
traditional language than learn a new language[4-6]. originated from English. With the development of
science and technology, the word muso has evolved into
Esperanto has been debating its own shortcomings
the meaning of "mouse" along with “mouse (a small
since its inception, such as its plural ending -j, its plural
device that you move across a surface to move a cursor
adjectives, its overly “Europeanized” vocabulary, its
on your computer screen)”, and has become one of the
vibrato R, and the fact that the letters with diacritics are,
few polysemous words in Esperanto. Many Esperanto
in common, difficult to type on the keyboard. Although
speakers are also strongly supporting and promoting the
the grammar of Esperanto is rather rigorous, there are
Esperanto movement.
still some deficiencies. For example, the word "liberty"
is "libero", and the word "liberalism" is "liberalismo";
However, according to the word-formation patterns, 4.2. Unification of Global Languages
"liberalism" should be "liberismo". Also, the gender From the point of view of Chinese history, before
affixes -o and -ino are thought to be detrimental to Qin Shihuang unified the six kingdoms, he implemented
gender equality. the system of "writing with the same text", which means
Personally, I do not see Esperanto as “perfect”, to unify the characters [8-10]. Thanks to the unity of
however, because of its neutrality, its imperfection does language, the Great Qin Empire could become powerful.
not prevent it from being an ideal solution for an Similarly, if the world today wants to promote economic
international secondary language. In fact, thanks to the development, it is very beneficial to have a globally
flexibility of Esperanto, most of its shortcomings do not unified language.
affect people's basic communication. For example, Today, the world has more than 200 countries and
many Chinese learners dislike the vibrato R in more than 5000 languages, and translating every
Esperanto and wish to remove this difficult sound from document of the United Nations into various languages

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would be cumbersome and wasteful. Therefore, the call Interdisciplinary Description of Complex Systems -
for Esperanto as the official language is getting louder scientific journal 13.2(2015):317-320.
and louder. With the advent of globalization, the
[8] C. Baier, J-P. Katoen, Principles of Model
unification of languages will inevitably be put on the
Checking, MIT Press, 2008.
agenda. It can be proved that Esperanto has always
existed in daily application. From the current trend, [9] Wang Shimin. "Qin Shihuang unified China's
Esperanto will not only not die out, but will be historical role - from archeology, the unity of the
recognized, learned and promoted by more and more intersection and currency." Archaeological 6
people. The development of Esperanto shows its vitality. (1973): 8.

5. CONCLUSION [10] Tao Z . An Investigation of I Ching Thought in the

Qin Dynasty[J]. Hanxue Yanjiu (Chinese Studies),
Through research, I have reached the conclusion that 2000.
Esperanto, as the best choice of communicating
language globally, has not lost its vitality, but has not
been fully developed in the world yet. The development
of Esperanto depends on the advocacy and support of
governments of various countries, the efforts of global
Esperanto speakers, and the gradual common
application of the international public. Thus, to make
Esperanto truly exert its potential vitality, a worldwide
effort should be made to strengthen its publicity and its
application breadth should be expanded, encouraging it
to progress with the development of the major national
languages until it becomes a veritable international
auxiliary language. This article will arouse the
awareness about the significance of Esperanto. In the
final analysis, Esperanto is a door to easier global
communication, and to an entirely shared world, and
this article is just the key to open this door.

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[2] Zhu Mingyi. "UNESCO adopts resolutions on
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[3] Bezares-Roder. “About Esperanto”, January 2006.
[4] Xiong Qiuliang. "Analysis of "La Jeunesse" on the
discussion of Chinese language. Journal of
Southwest Jiaotong University: Social Science
Edition 5.3 (2004): 4.
[5] Li Y. A Discussion on Tibetan language
Subconscious Emotion——An Analysis of
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[6] Xiao-Fang L I. Discussion on Literary Style of
Module Teaching on Higher Vocational Chinese
Language Explanation and Reading of Text[J].
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[7] Wandel, and Amri. "How Many People Speak
Esperanto? Esperanto on the Web."

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