What is Esperanto, and what place does it have in a post-Brexit EU?
As the brits prepare to leave the EU, the Esperanto movement hopes to outmatch their common tongue with the artificial language. But what are the chances of a new federal language in the European Union?
By Olivia Høj Fälling & Lasse Bækhus
“Voluntolado por TEJO,” it says on the whiteboard in the little meeting room in Folkehuset in Aarhus, a Danish city. The local Esperanto community is meeting up to hear about 20 years old Mia’s volunteer work for The World Esperanto Youth Organisation, which might seem obvious for most people: voluntolado is not that far from the English volunteering, the Spanish voluntario or the polish wolontariusz. But it is the artificial language Esperanto.
“Much of the vocabulary is from English, German and Spanish. I would say, that with these three languages, you have probably about 70 per cent of the Esperanto lexicon for free,” says Federico Gobbo, a professor of Interlinguistics and Esperanto at the University of Amsterdam.
Esperanto was created by Ludwik Lejzer Zammenhof, who was a Polish doctor. In order to prevent miscommunication, which in his opinion led to war and conflicts, he aimed to invent a language that was easy to learn and did not contain grammatical irregularities. And so he did. Created from the Romance, Slavic and Germanic language families it is not even that far from languages, that a significant amount of the world population already knows.
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A new federal language without imperialism
As the gathering in Aarhus goes along, Esperanto is spoken fluently by people on different levels, some have spoken it since they were children, some have learned it recently. For foreign ears, it sounds as if it was their mother tongue.
Listen to the Aarhusian Esperanto Club speak Esperanto below
As they have finished with the formalities and presentations, they move on to playing a game of cards. Sitting around a table, communicating in Esperanto they do what most of them believe would be the optimal situation in the European Union.
And that is the whole idea with Esperanto. As it is nobody’s mother tongue, no one will be superior. Furthermore, Esperantists argue that a lot of those who speak English or for example french that is not from Great Britain or France has been forced to learn the language in the colonial times. That is what they want to change by having Esperanto as everyone's second language.
“We have a linguistic problem in the European Union. In order to overcome that problem, we need to adopt a language that is federal and not official. It should be above the others,” Gobbo said and added:
“(...) If we should have a minister of defence in the EU. Naturally, an army would follow. Do you want an army where you would need to say 'fire' in 24 different languages?”
But to have Esperanto as everyone's second language, would require some huge political decisions, according to professor of sociolinguistics at the University of Copenhagen, Marie Maegaard.
“English is our common language because of its history of spreading through imperialism and colonisation. But you cannot roll back history. How would you spread Esperanto without doing it in the same way that English has been spread,” said Marie Maegaard.
Maegaard said, that a new federal language is not something that a movement would be able to spread by itself, as it would require some restructuring throughout the whole political system: the school system, the private and public organisations, the scientific language, but also the language on the internet, where we acquire our knowledge about the world, she said.
According to professor in interlinguistics and Esperanto, Federico Gobbo, it is necessary to have a common language in the EU, but it would require a discussion within the Union about how to do it without being imperialistic.
Brexit creates new hope for the Esperanto Movement
As we speak, the working language in the European Union is English. But for Esperantists, there is a hope that Brexit will open doors for a discussion about a new federal language in the Union; Esperanto.
“I think a side effect of Brexit is, that now the European citizens start to think, that if the United Kingdom wants to leave us now, maybe we should not use their language,” Gobbo said. He is, as stated by himself, ‘in favour of giving a role to Esperanto to the goal of getting a better European Union’.
One of Gobbo’s arguments for having a federal language as Esperanto as the working language of EU is that no one will be rhetorically superior, as it is no one’s native language.
Derek Beach, professor of political science with a specialization in the European Union at Aarhus University, thinks the opposite. He thinks, that because the UK is now leaving the European Union, it will be easier for the remaining countries to have English as the common language.
“It is true, that the UK has had a small advantage in negotiations. But that will end now,” Beach said.
According to Gobbo though, maybe the exit of UK will make people stop thinking about English as a solution per default. He thinks, that the public awareness of language policy will increase, where Esperanto will be one of the solutions on the table.
Beach is still quite sure, that it is over and done with the chances for Esperanto to become a federal language. According to him, it should have been done a long time ago before English became the common working language.
Economically beneficial
According to the chairperson of the Danish Esperanto Organisation, Peter Wraae, having Esperanto as the official second language in the European Union would also be economically beneficial for the EU. He said that the union would be able to save a lot of spendings on the budget of interpreters, which for 2020 is budgeted to cost €47,5 million.
Derek Beach, professor of political science, agrees that Esperanto could be economically beneficial for the EU but he still has his reservations.
“... but there is a democratic principle in how you as a European citizen is able to listen to your own politicians speak your own language in the Parliament. So you would still need to have a translation,” said Beach.
A language of (in)equality?
“English is cultural imperialism. In school, English teaching is always linked to English speaking countries cultures. For me, it makes no sense, that I have to learn about the culture of the native speakers to communicate with someone who has nothing to do with it,” said the 20-year-old Mia, who had volunteered for the Youth Organisation of the Esperanto Movement.
The chairperson of the Danish Esperanto Organisation, Peter Wraae agrees. He argues that when everyone has Esperanto as their second language, no culture will be superior, which means that you will feel equal - not only linguistically, but also as human beings.
“You already have a common language, which of course is English. For better or for worse, English is already serving as a common language,” said Sharon Millar, PhD. and institutional leader at University Southern Denmark’s language and communication department.
“I do not think for one minute, that English is enough, I believe in multilingualism, you don't really understand the culture if you have no knowledge of the language. Even in a country where almost everyone speaks English, you would not fully understand or be a part of that society without the language,” Millar adds.
Marie Maegaard agrees. A language free of cultural heritage is something, that for Maegaard seems impossible. According to her, you will never get free of the fact, that someone will feel a special connection to a language, not even the artificial language Esperanto.
To Maegaard it is not only the cultural heritage that is criticizable about Esperanto. She argues, that it would still give preferential treatment to European countries and create linguistic inequality in a global context.
“The question that needs to be asked is, that with the language families it is based on, how would someone from Asia, who do not know about the typical European languages be placed in an international context, where Esperanto is the common language,” said Maegaard.
Gobbo admits that Esperanto in its essence is a very Eurocentric language, but that Esperanto learners from Asian countries like China are able to learn a decent level of Esperanto in just a couple of months, due to the simplicity of the grammar.
Peter Wraae has experienced this personally. When he attended an Esperanto event in China, many of the Chinese participants were more fluent in Esperanto within a few months of learning, than in English, despite having learned English in much of their education.
“I do not think that it would be possible to have a completely neutral language. I think it is utopian to imagine, that it would be possible to have Esperanto as a common second language,” Maegaard said.
Faces of the Aarhusian Esperanto Club
Svend Vendelbo Nielsen
A 28 year-old lecturer at Aarhus Universitet who teaches in statistics. He is active in the Esperanto movement to keep the language alive and believes that Esperanto one day should be a world language.
Unfortunately, he does not believe that it will be in his lifetime. Svend has furthermore used his education in statistics to look into the number of Esperanto speakers world wide.