Esperanto

Esperanto
Lingvo Internacia[1]
Esperanto[2]
Esperanto flag
Pronunciation[espeˈranto]
Created byL. L. Zamenhof
Date1887
Setting and usageInternational: most parts of the world
UsersNative: c. 1,000 (2022)[3]
L2: estimated 30,000 to 2 million
  • Sidney Culbert: Around 2 million
  • Amri Wandel: Above 2 million[4]
  • Svend Vendelbo: 30,000–180,000[5][4]
Purpose
Early form
Proto-Esperanto
Latin script (Esperanto alphabet)
Esperanto Braille
Signed forms
Signuno
SourcesPrimarily Romance and Germanic languages, with some influence of Slavic, Latin and Greek
Official status
Regulated byAkademio de Esperanto
Language codes
ISO 639-1eo
ISO 639-2epo
ISO 639-3epo
Linguist List
epo
Glottologespe1235
Linguasphere51-AAB-da
Esperantujo: Number of individual UEA members per million population in 2020.

Esperanto (/ˌɛspəˈrɑːnt/, /-ænt/)[7][8] is the world's most widely spoken constructed international auxiliary language. Created by L. L. Zamenhof in 1887 to be 'the International Language' (la Lingvo Internacia), it is intended to be a universal second language for international communication. He described the language in Dr. Esperanto's International Language (Unua Libro), which he published under the pseudonym Doktoro Esperanto. Early adopters of the language liked the name Esperanto and soon used it to describe his language. The word translates into English as 'one who hopes'.[9]

Within the range of constructed languages, Esperanto occupies a middle ground between "naturalistic" (imitating existing natural languages) and a priori (where features are not based on existing languages). Esperanto's vocabulary, syntax and semantics derive predominantly from languages of the Indo-European group. A substantial majority of its vocabulary (approximately 80%) derives from Romance languages, but it also contains elements derived from Germanic, Greek, and Slavic languages.[10] One of the language's most notable features is its extensive system of derivation, where prefixes and suffixes may be freely combined with roots to generate words, making it possible to communicate effectively with a smaller set of words.

Esperanto is the most successful constructed international auxiliary language, and the only such language with a sizeable population of native speakers (denaskuloj), of which there are an estimated 2,000.[3] Usage estimates are difficult, but two estimates put the number of people who know how to speak Esperanto at around 100,000.[5] Concentration of speakers is highest in Europe, East Asia, and South America. Although no country has adopted Esperanto officially, Esperantujo ('Esperanto land') is used as a name for the collection of places where it is spoken. The language has also gained a noticeable presence on the Internet. It is becoming increasingly accessible on platforms such as Wikipedia, Amikumu, Google Translate and Duolingo.[11][12] Esperanto speakers are often called Esperantists (Esperantistoj). A number of reforms, known as Esperantidos, have been proposed over the years.

  1. ^ Zamenhof, Lazaro Ludoviko (1888). "Aldono al la Dua Libro de l' Lingvo Internacia". Dua Libro de l' Lingvo Internacia (in Esperanto) (2006 ed.). Project Gutenberg. Retrieved March 15, 2022. Rakontinte mallonge la tutan konstruon de l' "Lingvo internacia" kaj ĝian gramatikon,[...]
  2. ^ "Plena Ilustrita Vortaro de Esperanto 2020".
  3. ^ a b Cite error: The named reference e25 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  4. ^ a b Wandel, Amri (2014). "How Many People Speak Esperanto? Esperanto on the Web". Interdisciplinary Description of Complex Systems. 13 (2): 318–321. doi:10.7906/indecs.13.2.9. A simple calculation accompanied by reasonable refinements leads to a number of approximately two million Esperanto users within the internet community alone, probably significantly more worldwide
  5. ^ a b 63,000 −50%/+200%: "Nova takso: 60.000 parolas Esperanton" [New estimate: 60,000 speak Esperanto] (in Esperanto). Libera Folio. February 13, 2017. Archived from the original on February 13, 2017. Retrieved February 13, 2017.
  6. ^ What is UEA? Archived June 26, 2015, at the Wayback Machine, Universal Esperanto Association, 2018. Retrieved July 21, 2018.
  7. ^ Jones, Daniel (2003) [1917], Peter Roach; James Hartmann; Jane Setter (eds.), English Pronouncing Dictionary, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, ISBN 3-12-539683-2
  8. ^ Wells, John C. (2008), Longman Pronunciation Dictionary (3rd ed.), Longman, ISBN 978-1-4058-8118-0
  9. ^ "Doktoro Esperanto, Ludwik Lejzer Zamenhof". Global Britannica.com. Encyclopædia Britannica Inc. Archived from the original on May 29, 2020. Retrieved December 3, 2016.
  10. ^ Puškar, Krunoslav (2015). Koutny, Ilona (ed.). "Common criticism of Esperanto: facts and fallacies" (PDF). Język. Komunikacja. Iinformacja (10). Poznań: 106. ISBN 978-83-63664-96-1. ISSN 1896-9585. Archived from the original (PDF) on April 18, 2016.
  11. ^ Cite error: The named reference :0 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  12. ^ Dean, Sam (May 29, 2015). "How an artificial language from 1887 is finding new life online". The Verge. Archived from the original on December 26, 2017. Retrieved June 26, 2021.