On Oct 8, 7:30 am, Bob LeChevalier <loj...@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:
> "angell.ja...@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
" <angell.ja...@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:
> >I'm interest in learning a language as near to perfect as possible and
> >from what I've been reading that is either Ido or Lojban. But I
> >cannot find enough information about Ido to be sure if Lojban is
> >better, which it seems it might be. It also seems like it would feel
> >less human. Can anyone help me with this so I don't have to try to
> >learn both???
>
> Lojban is most certainly a human language, and when using it, one
> feels no less human than using any other language. There is, however,
> a large ****tion of the Lojban community that tend to strive for just
> the right nuance of meaning in a way rather few speakers of other
> languages try for. This is possibly because the language is so
> different from English or most other languages in its basic structure
> that one really has to think about what one is trying to say, rather
> than merely to translate the words of another language.
>
> This makes translation a good deal harder; it is simply too easy to
> think that you can just substitute Lojban words, rearrange to fit a
> funky grammatical order, and think that the translation works.
>
> I don't know Ido, but from prior discussions, it is a
> not-especially-major reform of Esperanto. It thus falls into the
> category sometimes labeled as "Euroclones" because they also use more
> or less the same European word-stock and grammatical categories and
> terminology that are appropriate to western Indo-European languages.
> This word stock makes the vocabulary somewhat easy to learn for a
> European language speaker, but the languages aren't the least bit
> "perfect" by the standards of non-European language native speakers
> (they may be somewhat easier to learn for such non-Europeans, because
> they tend to have few irregularities).
>
> One chooses a Euroclone for ease of learning, and the likelihood of
> finding others who can and will learn the language. But given those
> goals, most would typically choose Esperanto because there are so many
> more using that language than any other Euroclone. The improvements
> that others see in other Euroclones don't outweigh the fact that far
> fewer people know and use the them.
>
> Lojban is easier to learn than natural languages, and one can reach a
> low level of competence in the grammar relatively quickly.
> The lexicon is harder to learn for a European language speaker than
> that of a Euroclone, because its wordstock is NOT European (there are
> some words that have apparent cognates, and the Lojban wordlists
> include "keywords" that are not always definitional, which try to aid
> cognate-recognition. Mastery of the unique subtleties of the language
> takes a variable amount of time because of the need to abandon
> language habits.
>
> A large percentage of the Lojban community, but by no means all of it,
> would fall into the general category of "computer nerds", and this may
> skew the topics and styles of conversation. There is a tendency to
> try to communicate on a post-college-graduate level of discussion
> using a vocabulary mastery comparable to that a child has in the
> natural languages. People try it anyway, and some are disappointed.
>
> The Lojban community has become large and is mutually sup****tive in
> learning the language. I just got statistical data (which someone
> asked for a few months ago), and we have 457 people on our main email
> list and 413 on our beginners list. There is some overlap, and many
> people are just lurkers, but over 100 different people have posted
> some 2000 posts so far this year. There is quite a lot of non-mailing
> list activity, with a fair amount of IRC traffic (channel #lojban of
> course), a few blogs, and changes to the wiki pages every day or two.
>
> I cannot say that I have heard much of any significant Ido activity,
> but I also haven't been looking.
>
> lojbab
This was a very informative and helpful post. Though the number of
speakers doesn't matter to me too much. There isn't much Ido activity
but Ido has more momentum than Lojban so far (more articles, blogs,
books, and speakers). On the other hand you make it sound as though
Lojban is gathering momentum quickly...which is good I suppose but I
am more interested in speaking in a language which is relatively free
from implicit Judeo/christian values than anything else. (being
logical, grammatically simple, and having strong connotation are all
also perks).
You seem to have confirmed my suspicion that Lojban is the correct
choice but Ido is easier to learn and than maybe I should start with
Ido to limber up my mind. Lojban is invariable the purer thought
modeler - more free of biases and implied ways of thought but Ido
can't be too far behind. And ido also is phonetic and lacking of
irregularity as I understand it...it WAS a reform of Esperanto created
by some hardcore language purists.
Anyways, I guess my only remaining question is: How long does it take
the average person to learn Lojban? How many words are there? I
learned basic Hebrew in 2 years...but I was in Israel where it is
spoken. I can't seem to find Lojbanistan on the map :)
|
