Esperanto ĉe la Universitato de Roĉestro

Homework

• If you didn’t send me your solutions to chapter 7, check your answers against the answer key.
• For next week, study the material in chapter 8, do exercises 8.1–8.5, and answer the questions at the end of the dialogue.

In class

This week we reviewed ways to tell time, using examples from last week’s episode of Pasporto al la tuta mondo. Click on the thumbnail at left for class notes in PDF form.

Next we talked about the comparatives pli and plej, and various ways to use them when making comparisons, e.g. pli granda ol… or plej alta el…. We also covered four new affixes introduced in chapter eight: -ar, -ad, -ebl and -ind.

Regarding my question last week of what you plan to do with Esperanto, here’s a charming online booklet (a “zine”) that you should see.

The author (mathematician Arlyn Kerr) presents some snapshots from her personal journey with the language; they’re great examples of how Esperanto can open doors both figuratively and literally. Some of the material will already be familiar to you, but it’s definitely worth a look!

Homework

• If you didn’t send me your solutions to chapter 6, check your answers against the answer key.
• For next week, study the material in chapter 7, do exercises 7.1–7.5, and answer the questions at the end of the dialogue.

In class

We talked about ways of telling time, and the use of kioma for asking what time (“which hour”) it is. The correlative word kiom asks for a number, and kioma asks for a number ending in -a, e.g., an ordinal:

Kiom kostas la pomo? —Tri dolaroj.
Kioma horo estas? —Estas la tria horo.

As in English, there are lots of different ways we can express the same information about what time it is:

Estas la tria horo kaj dek kvin minutoj.
Estas la tria kaj dek kvin.
Estas la tria dek kvin.
Estas la tria kaj kvarono.

In some countries it’s customary to use 24-hour time, e.g., Estas la dek-kvina horo. For 12-hour time we use the abbreviations atm (antaŭ tagmeze, or “a to mo”) and ptm (post tagmeze, or “po to mo”).

Je la tria atm mi dormas, sed je la tria ptm mi laboras.

Pasporto al la tuta mondo

Ni rigardis la duan lecionon de Pasporto al la tuta mondo, en kiu oni parolas pri horoj kaj demandoj kun “kiom” kaj “kioma”. (En la suba filmo, la dua leciono komenciĝas (=begins) je 7 minutoj kaj 15 sekundoj…)

(Por ĉiuj lecionoj, vidu la paĝon de Pasporto ĉe YouTube.)

Homework

• Finish the exercises in chapter 6 and answer the questions about the dialogue. As usual, you can send me your answers for corrections.

• A reminder: the readings in each lesson introduce a lot of needed vocabulary. It isn’t enough to simply read through once to get the gist of an article; ideally you should re-read the text several times:

  1. On the first pass, just try to get a general idea of what’s going on, without stopping to look up definitions.
  2. Go through the text carefully to identify words that are new, stopping to look up each one in a dictionary or in the word list at the end of the chapter.
  3. Now that none of the words should be completely unfamiliar, try reading through the text once more and see if you can understand it completely.
  4. Ideally, aim for a fourth pass where you can read the entire text smoothly with full comprehension.

  While rereading may seem like overkill at first, you’ll find it enormously helpful in retaining the material. The repeated exposure to model style will also help you build the linguistic “intuition” you’ll need when constructing sentences in everyday speech and writing.

Homework

• If you didn’t send me your solutions to chapter 5, check your answers against the key on the course page.
• Start reading chapter 6 for next Tuesday, and do exercises 6.1–6.3. As usual, you can send me your answers for corrections.
• If you haven’t written to a penpal yet, do so now! If you need help writing something, just let me know.

In class

We reviewed chapter 5 and watched part 4 of Mazi en Gondolando:

Impersonal verbs

Chapter 6 introduces the idea of impersonal verbs — verbs that don’t need a subject. Impersonal verbs are often used when describing the weather. Pluvas (=Estas pluve), it rains. We don’t say Ĝi pluvas, because there’s no “ĝi” that is raining! Hajlas, neĝas, tondras, fulmas. It’s hailing, snowing, thundering, lightning. Frostas (Estas froste), nebulas, nubas, rosas, silentas, sunas, ventas, ŝtormas. It is frosty, foggy, cloudy, dewy, silent, sunny, windy, stormy.

Poetry

We also read and translated the simple poem Ho, mia kor’. Note how elision is used to achieve the desired rhyme and meter. In Esperanto the final -o of nouns can be omitted (“elided”) when there are no other grammatical endings following it. So we can elide the -o in koro, for example, but not in koroj or korojn. The elided -o is replaced with an apostrophe, and the stress within the word remains the same as before.

We can also convert la to l’ in cases where it is preceded or followed by a vowel: de la batado becomes de l’ batado.

Finding a penpal

Check out the section for individuals seeking penpals at edukado.net. You’ll see the first part of a long, long list. Click on individual names to find out more about each, person including their retadreso (email address).

Using the pull-down menus in the left-hand column you can narrow the list by Lando, Nivelo (level) and Sekso. The options for nivelo are komencanto (beginner), komencinto (post-beginner), meznivelulo (mid-level) and progresanto (“progressing”—i.e., more advanced). I encourage you to choose someone at the level of komencinto or above so that you can learn from them.

Stock phrases

In class we covered various phrases and terms (for studies, hobbies, etc.) that might be useful for putting together a first letter to a new penpal. Here’s a list:

Greetings:

Saluton!

Kara ____,

Body:

(Mia nomo estas / Mi estas) _____.

(Mi venas el / Mi loĝas en) _____.

(Mi estas studento / Mi studas) ĉe la Universitato de Roĉestro (Rochester), en Roĉestro, Novjorkio, Usono.

Ĉu vi studas? / Kion vi studas?

Ĉu vi laboras? / Kion vi faras?

Mi havas 19 jarojn. / Mi estas 19-jaraĝa. / Mi estas X-jarulo.

Kiom da jaroj vi havas? / Kiom jaraĝa vi estas?

Mi havas X frat(in)o(j)n. Mia fratino havas X-jarojn kaj mia frato estas Y-jaraĝa.

Kiom da gefratoj vi havas?

Ĉu vi havas gefratojn?

Miaj ŝatokupoj estas ____. / Mi ŝatas ____.

Kiuj estas viaj ŝatokupoj? / Kion vi ŝatas fari dum via libertempo (= free-time)?

Closings:

Ĝis la reskribo,

Amike (= “in friendship”)

Sincere (via),

Mi avide atendas vian respondon!

Names for studies and hobbies

Mi studas…

biokemion

studojn de la virino / virinajn studojn

ekonomikon

lingvojn / lingvosciencon

la japanan lingvon

politikan sciencon

Mi ŝatas / miaj ŝatokupoj estas…

dormi

ĵongli (= juggling)

naĝi en la maro

skermi (=fencing)

legi librojn

lerni lingvojn

baki

iri al plaĝoj

iri al kinejoj / spekti filmojn

marŝi en la arbaro

bicikli

Putting it all together: a sample letter…

Kara korespond-amiko,

Mi estas Bella [bela], dekok-jara virino. Mi venas el Fenikso, granda urbo en la usona ŝtato Arizona. Mi ne havas gefratojn. Nun mi studas biokemion ĉe la Universitato de Roĉestro, en Roĉestro (Rochester), Novjorkio, Usono. Roĉestro estas mezgranda urbo en la nord-orienta parto de Usono, apud la granda lago Ontario. Tro ofte neĝas ĉi tie! Mi ŝategas lup-homojn kaj vampirojn. En mia libertempo mi ŝatas legi librojn kaj veturi per motorciklo.

Mi nun lernas Esperanton kaj mi serĉas eksterlandajn amikojn por praktiki la lingvon. Kiom da jaroj havas vi? Ĉu vi laboras? Ĉu vi studas? Kiuj estas viaj ŝatokupoj? Ĉu vi estas vampiro? Ĉu vi konas luphomojn? Skribu al mi, mi petas!

Ĝis la reskribo!
Bella

Ban Ki-moon, a South Korean diplomat, is Secretary General of the United Nations. Kalocsay Kálmán was a prominent 20th century Hungarian poet. Looking at these examples, can you tell what the family names are? Unless you’re familiar with Korean and Hungarian customs, you might not know that these cultures usually put the family name before the given name.

To avoid confusion in international communication, Esperanto speakers sometimes spell family names using all capital letters, e.g. Kalocsay Kálmán or Ban Ki-moon. This custom allows everyone to preserve the order to which they’re accustomed, without causing confusion for others. You might want to do the same when writing your first letter to your pen-pal.

In class we talked about the dilemma of representing given names in Esperanto. Being nouns, names should ideally end in -o in order to be pronouncable when the grammatical ending -n is needed. But sometimes a final -o is undesirable, especially in cultures that reserve that sound for male names. Thus it’s common to see female names in Esperanto ending in -a: Silvja, Maria, Klara, etc.

In general, there are three methods used when converting names for use in Esperanto. We’ll use the English name Charles as an example:

1. “Translation” to an established Esperanto equivalent: Karlo
2. Transliteration of the name’s pronunciation using Esperanto’s orthography: Ĉarlz
3. No change. The name is simply spelled in the native alphabet, with the possible addition of pronunciation hints in brackets: Charles [ĉarlz].

The last two methods can be awkward in speech and writing if the result doesn’t end in -o (or at least a vowel). In that case grammatical endings are added when needed, using a dash in written form: “Charles vidis min, kaj mi vidis Charles-on.”

So what should you use for your name? That’s up to you. Some people take the opportunity to adopt a new name, specifically for use in Esperanto. Hey, who hasn’t always longed for a secret identity? :-)

Here are a few possibilities for students in the Spring 2010 class:

• Andrea [andrea] → Andrea
• Ashish [aŝiŝ] → Aŝiŝ, Aŝiŝo
• Christine [kristin] → Kristina
• Edwin [edŭen] → Edveno
• Glenn [glen] → Gleno
• Kaitlyn [kejtln] → Katalina, Katlina
• Laura [lora] → Lora, Laŭra
• Tim [tim] → Timoteo
• Tory [tori] → Tori
• Xiao [ŝaŭ] → Ŝaŭo

To give you an idea of some of the many options, here’s a sampling of historical and literary names in Esperanto from mostly European sources—some common, some exotic:

Female names (many can have either -a or -o endings):

Ada, Adelo, Adriana, Agato, Alberta, Aleksandra, Alico, Amelio, Anabelo, Andrea, Anita, Anjo, Anĝela, Aprilo, Ariana, Aŭdreo, Barb(a)ra, Beatrico, Belindo, Berta, Brigito, Cecilio, Celestina, Cintio, Ĉarloto, Dafneo, Daniela, Debora, Diana, Dora, Doriso, Doroteo, Edito, Eleonoro, Eliza, Elizabeto, Elvira, Elza, Emilia, Emma, Erika, Etelo, Eva, Fatima, Filiso, Flor(enc)o, Franciska, Freja, Frida, Gabriela, Gerda, Gertrudo, Greta, Gvendolino, Ĝojo, Halina, Hedvigo, Heleno, Heloiza, Henrieto, Hermiono, Hiacinto, Hilda, Ida, Ilona, Ina, Irina, Iriso, Izabela, Jakelino, Jasmeno, Jocelino, Johana, Jolanda, Judita, Julia, Junio, Karena, Karla, Karmeno, Katia, Katlino, Katrina, Klara, Kleopatra, Konstancia, Kordelio, Kristina, Larisa, Laŭra, Lea, Lidia, Liza, Lucia, Lucilo, Luiza, Magda, Majo, Margareto, Maria, Marlena, Marta, Matilda, Miĥaela, Mira, Mirando, Mona, Monika, Moniko, Nadja, Nastazja, Nataŝa, Nikola, Nina, Nora, Oksana, Olga, Olivo, Pamela, Paŭla, Penelopeo, Petra, Raĥelo, Rebeka, Renata, Rita, Roksana, Roz(ali)o, Roza, Sabina, Sandra, Sara, Sibilo, Sofia, Sonja, Stefanio, Suzana, Talia, Tamara, Tanja, Tatjana, Terezo, Tina, Ulrika, Ursulo, Valerio, Vanesa, Ver(onik)o, Viktoria, Vilma, Viol(et)o, Virginio

Male names:

Arono, Adamo, Alano, Alberto, Aleks(andr)o, Alfredo, Andreo, Anton(i)o, Arnoldo, Arturo, Aŭgusto, Benedikto, Benjameno, Bernardo, Bertrando, Boriso, Bruno, Cecilo, Cezaro, Cirilo, Danielo, Davido, Denizo, Dimitro, Djego, Dominiko, Donaldo, Duglaso, Edgaro, Edmundo, Edvardo, Edveno, Eriko, Ernesto, Eŭgeno, Felikso, Filipo, Francisko, Franko, Frederiko, Gabrielo, Gastono, Georgo, Gilberto, Gregoro, Gustavo, Ĝeraldo, Ĝermano, Ĝilo, Haroldo, Hektoro, Henriko, Herberto, Horacio, Hu(m)berto, Hugo, Ivano, Ivo, Jakobo, Jano, Jeremio, Johano, Josuo, Jozefo, Julio, Justeno, Kar(o)lo, Kazimiro, Keneto, Klarenco, Knuto, Konrado, Kristoforo, Ladislao, Laŭr(enc)o, Leonardo, Leopoldo, Luko, Makso, Manuelo, Marcelo, Mario, Marko, Marteno, Mateo, Miĥaelo, Natano, Nestoro, Nikolao, Norman(d)o, Olivero, Omaro, Oskaro, Osvaldo, Patriko, Paŭlo, Percevalo, Petro, Rafaelo, Ralfo, Raulo, Rikardo, Roberto, Rolando, Rolfo, Ronaldo, Roĝero, Rudolfo, Samuelo, Serĝo, Sidneo, Silvestro, Sim(e)ono, Stefano, Tadeo, Teodoro, Tiberio, Timoteo, Tomaso, Ulriko, Umberto, Vaclavo, Valtero, Viktoro, Vilhelmo, Vladimiro, Volfgango, Zaĥario

Homework

• Please finish up chapter 5 for next Tuesday. As usual, you can send me your answers at hoss dot firooznia ĉe rochester dot edu for corrections, or you can check them yourself against the answer key in class.
• Choose one or more penpals (korespondamikoj) in another country and send them an introductory letter about yourself. A good place to look is the Koresponda Servo at edukado.net. I’ll have more posts soon with tips for using the Koresponda Servo and writing a letter.

In class

Using -n to show motion

An important part of chapter 5 is the introduction of -n to show motion. Up to now, the motion indicated by -n has been exclusively of a metaphorical sort, simply showing the direct object in a sentence, e.g.

Ŝi vidas la brunan hundon.
La ruĝan pomon manĝis la viro.
Kiujn librojn vi jam legis?

But the -n can also be used to show more literal motion to a place. Compare:

La kato saltas sur la tablo. = The cat jumped on the table.
La kato saltas sur la tablon. = The cat jumped onto the table.

In the first sentence, the cat is on the table, jumping around. In the second sentence, the cat wasn’t on the table to begin with: it jumps onto the table. This indication of motion with -n can be used with adverbs and some correlatives, too:

Kie ŝi marŝis? = Where was she walking (around)?
Ŝi marŝis hejme. = She was walking (around) at home.
Kien ŝi marŝis? = (To) where did she walk?
Ŝi marŝis hejmen. = She walked (to) home.

Another way of thinking about this use of -n is to imagine that it replaces a copy of the preposition al (to):

La kato saltas al sur la tablo. = La kato saltas sur la tablon.

(Note: the combination al sur isn’t grammatically correct; it’s being used here merely for the sake of example.)

Using verbs together

Sometimes we want to use two verbs together, one right after the other, e.g. “I wanted to drink water.” or “I can see you.”. In Esperanto, the first verb takes whatever tense is appropriate (present, past, imperative, etc.), while the second verb takes the infinitive tense, -i:

Mi volis trinki akvon. = I wanted to drink water.
Mi povas vidi vin! = I can see you!
Ĉu vi devos foriri morgaŭ? = Will you have to leave tomorrow?

More about letter-writing shortly…

Homework

• For those who didn’t complete the exercises in chapter 4 over break, please finish those up by next week. Send me your answers at hoss dot firooznia at rochester dot edu for corrections, or check them against the answer key.
• Start reading chapter 5 and do exercises 5.1 and 5.2.
• In the Richardson text, read the two short essays starting on page 175: La vetero en Svedlando and Pri Zamenhof. Not all of the grammar will be familiar, but you should be able to follow along. There are no exercises; the goal is simply to start using what you’ve learned so far.

In class

We talked about words for body parts: okuloj, oreloj, buŝo, piedoj, and so on. We were helped by assistant professor Cooper, a talented denaskulo (native speaker):

We also watched more of Mazi en Gondolando, which also covers some of the same words: