Christa627:I'm back!

Welcome back to the fray, Christa.

Hi morfran!

I've been rereading some of the previous messages, and had some questions and observations.

erinja:For example, someone active in online Esperanto forums is likely to know the meaning of 'mojosa' (even if they might think, like me, that the word itself is the very embodiment of uncoolness, and makes its speaker seem uncool as soon as the word is spoken).

Interesting that you say that, as the most effective use of this word I have ever seen was in this quote in Kontakto:

Fernando:Ĉiel ajn, mi ŝatus konfesi, ke al mi mia generacio ŝajnas duonmalviva, aŭtomata, laŭfluiranta. Mi ne parolas pri miaj verdaj amikoj, sed pri nia generacio ĝenerale. Ĝi sekvas nur malprofundajn kulturaĵojn, facilan muzikon, facilegajn komediprogramojn, kaj ĝia nura celo ŝajnas esti mojosaĉa.

I was impressed with the way 'mojosaĉa' does seem to very aptly describe the modern youth culture.

But if 'mojosa' is the very embodiment of uncoolness, what is the embodiment of coolness ?

erinja:The online Esperanto community more or less decided ages ago that a computer is "komputilo", but in real life, I still see a not-insignificant proportion of older people using "komputoro", which was the Academy's recommendation before komputilo "won" in the usage game.

Interesting... I didn't know that.

Christa627:At any rate, whatever changes may happen in Esperanto, rendering the older works unintelligible is exactly what is NOT supposed to happen.

I do not claim to be an expert historical esperantist, but I have had no difficulty (within whatever competence I have) reading 100+ year old texts, including those of Zamenhof himself (such as the Esenco kaj Estonteco de la Ideo de Lingvo Internacia). Yes, there have been new vocabulary roots for matters which Z himself may not have been able to imagine (consider modern computer terminology), as well as new styles and emphases, but the language itself has remained remarkably stable. In light of how many other proposed constructed languages have fallen by the wayside, I consider this a very strong point in Esperanto's favor.

sudanglo:

Well, you shouldn't kabei, you should just crocodile all the time!

Some Esperantists have enthusiastically followed your brother's advice.

Lions, tigers, crocodiles, oh my!

sudanglo: And as to political correctness on sexism - phooey.

Lol. I'm right with you on that!

sudanglo:Can I remind everybody that this thread was about the accusative being phased out - which it isn't.

Yes, you can remind everybody, but whether they will listen is highly doubtful . But I am very glad that the accusative isn't being phased out.

Fortunately, the "eternaj komencantoj" do not have the sway to change the way Esperanto is written/spoken in the sweeping ways that they would. It is sort of funny, that those who want to change our language are almost always those who haven't arrived at a certain level of mastery yet. It is sort of a "Kinderkrankheit" of new Esperantists. Interesting enough, a great deal of slang enters ethnic languages by way of teenagers. In this point, Esperanto is an exception.
English speakers battle with the accusative - they claim - but your don't hear any of them saying (or writing) "Don't hit I" or "I saw he". But there are some who say: "She did it for him and I" (those who ran through the class when the teacher was telling us about grammar).

bartlett22183:

Christa627:At any rate, whatever changes may happen in Esperanto, rendering the older works unintelligible is exactly what is NOT supposed to happen.

I do not claim to be an expert historical esperantist, but I have had no difficulty (within whatever competence I have) reading 100+ year old texts, including those of Zamenhof himself (such as the Esenco kaj Estonteco de la Ideo de Lingvo Internacia). Yes, there have been new vocabulary roots for matters which Z himself may not have been able to imagine (consider modern computer terminology), as well as new styles and emphases, but the language itself has remained remarkably stable. In light of how many other proposed constructed languages have fallen by the wayside, I consider this a very strong point in Esperanto's favor.

Same here. I can read the works of Zamenhof and his contemporaries without significant difficulty; sometimes there is unfamiliar word usage, such as "grandegula" where we would normally say "giganta", but generally it is the same. That's how it's supposed to be; whatever tweaking may be done, it must never change the essence of the language such that reading the earlier works feels like reading Interlingua or something (I have visited the Interlingua and Ido Wikipedias, and found that I can kinda understand most of it, but it's not like real reading). If that happened, what we would have would not be Esperanto, but a different language under the same name. Happily, that seems to be a very unlikely scenario.

Off-topic but slightly amusing observation: My spell-checker does not like the word "Esperantist." It suggests "antiperspirant." Silly spell-checker!

I just realized that Erinja's opinion about the word "mojosa" is basically the same as my opinion about the expression "cool beans!" The latter expression I use sometimes, but only sarcastically.

I like the word mojosa

My favorite word of all though is volapukajxo

basica:I like the word mojosa

My favorite word of all though is volapukajxo

I couldn't pick a top favorite word, but volapukaĵo does rank pretty high. I once looked at the Volapük Wikipedia (Vükiped), and found that it is indeed very much "volapukaĵo!" .

As for mojosa, I don't really have any strong like or dislike for it; I just typed 'awesome' into the lernu! dictionary and that's what it gave me. Then I looked it up in ReVo, and it had a link to a Vikipedia article about the word, which I read with great interest. Apparently some people said, "We need a word for 'cool.' Let's come up with one. Hmmm... how about 'modern-youth-style'? Nah, that's too long. We'll shorten it to 'MJS,' which is pronounced 'moyosa'."

That is my very short paraphrase of what I remember from the article. In my opinion, this is a silly way to come up with a word for 'cool,' and to have it be an abbreviation for 'modern youth style' is even sillier. But that's what the lernu! dictionary gave me, and I see it fairly frequently on the Internet.

This article mentioned the 'preposition' na, and, of course, linked to the Vikipedia article about it, which I read (I thrive on Wikipedia rabbit trails!). That was the first time I ever heard of na-ism. Since then the only place I've seen it in use is on one blog, the author of which uses rather strange Esperanto in general (like sticking -e to words that are already adverbs). It's legible, but rather distracting.

Christa627:(I thrive on Wikipedia rabbit trails!)

Oh my, I know this just too well. I have spent hours hopping from one rabbit hole in wikipedia to the next completely forgetting what time it was. Don't dive into every rabbit hole. And I will tell you this: You will never catch the white rabbit.