Esperanto

Esperanto flag

UNDER CONSTRUCTION
UNDER CONSTRUCTION
Esperanto is a constructed language created in 1887 by Ludwig L. Zamenhof. He was a Polish doctor who lived in a a region where many languages were spoken, and he wanted people to be able to communicate more readily. Esperanto is derived from elements from Romance and Germanic languages, with some Slavic and Greek.

History of Esperanto movement

Braille and sign language versions have been developed, and a Esperanto-language version of Wikipedia has about 382,000 articles. At least two million people speak Esperanto in the 70 countries of the U.E.A. ("Universala Esperanta-Asocio", or "World Esperanto Association").

Characteristics of the language

Words in Esperanto are pronounced the way they are spelled. The language uses an alphabet of 28 letters, each of which always has the same sound, except for variations related to the position inside the word. The language has 16 rule with no exception. There are no irregular verbs, and only one conjugation.

Critics of the language have regarded it as too Euro-centric and could be designed with a simpler grammar.

Theosophy and Esperanto

Theosophists and Spiritualists were keenly interested at the beginning of the Twentieth Century. Mrs. Edith M. MacHutchin wrote in 1903 that William T. Stead was acting as printer for an Esperanto grammar called Elementary Lessons by John Charles O'Connor.

Mr. W. T. Stead has given three notices on Esperanto in the last three issues of 'Review of Reviews,' and further has given his kind an able support to the movement by drawing together, at Mowbray House, people interested in Esperanto to the extent of forming a club or society in London.

A Theosophic-Esperanto Organization was formed:

The Theosophic-Esperanto organization, which is world-wide in its membership, held a successful meeting in connection with the Eight International Esperanto Congress in Cracow (Austrian Poland) las summer.

It will continue with renewed vigor its two-fld task: This, of bringing Theosophy to the favorable attention of Esperantists... and, secondly, of seeking to persuade Theosophist to learn for their own purposes this easy and satisfactory medium of international communication, and prepare to adopt Esperanto as the ultimately officialized international language for all Theosophic Publications and communications.

In July 1913, Alwyn J. Baker sent a postcard from Krotona Court to his friend Dangerfield in Berkeley. Baker was a nationally known Theosophical lecturer and a proponent of the Blue Ridge Brotherhood, a proposed Theosophical colony near Asheville, Tennessee. The message was written in Esperanto:

Theosophical journals frequently mentioned Esperanto in articles and advertisements.

1912 advertisement in The Theosophical Messenger

From 2010:

We know we can count on the possibility that in those countries where the Theosophical Society operates there are Esperantists available to give free courses of Esperanto. Moreover, Internet offers further possibilities. This would allow to dream about the prospect to talk together in our international meetings and congresses using this language. On a subtler and more refined level, we can convey our energies to strengthen more and more a thought-form. Thanks to this we shall be able to let "that" possible world stand out, where every human being will be able to know and speak the homely dialect to feeI the belonging to his/her tribe; where every human being will speak and write the national language with mastery in order to feel part of the history and of the culture where his/her roots come from; Iast but not least, in this world every human being will be able to rely on Esperanto to recognize him/herseIf, starting from language, equal in dignity, rights and possibilities to all the other human beings.

Believing, like Pythagoras and Plato, that the world expresses Logos also means deciding to feel oneself part of this project. Our Theosophical Society operates in 54 different countries, with 42 national magazines. Why not aiming, in a hopefully short time, at starting publishing the translation into Esperanto of one of the articles on some of our magazines, and then, later on, sharing it with the other ones? It should also be a good way to reinforce contacts with the other groups, bringing in an actual contribution to the cooperation and the common aims of our whole organization.

Additional resources

Articles

• Esperanto in Wikipedia.
• The Theosophical Society and the Esperanto Language by Piermichele Giordano. Published in Italian and English in Revista Italiana di Teosofia (June 2010): 32-35.
• Esperanto: the International Language

Video

This is a sampling of the numerous videos available on the Internet in Esperanto:

• What is Esperanto? Introduction to the International Language! posted August 4, 2022 by Big Bong.
• Esperanto Variety Show has over 200 entertaining videos for learning Esperanto.
• Videos to learn Esperanto. Uploaded to Esperanto Fremont on September 12, 2013.
• Esperanto: Like a Native uploaded to German Polyglot on February 20, 2015. An interview with 6 of the ca. 1000 worldwide native speakers of the constructed language Esperanto. Video on occasion of the UN International Mother Language Day 2015.

Websites

• Teozofio Esperante website offers videos and other information about Theosophy in the Esperanto language.
• Vikipedio, Wikipedia in Esperanto, with over 380,000 articles.
• Films in Esperanto. Children's stories, interviews, concert videos, TEDX talks, and more in Esperanto.
• Esperanto-USA website.
• Esperanto.net.