I tried learning Esperanto through Duolingo, but was a bit disappointed. It was still a bit inconsistent here and there; I was hoping for a 'perfect' language without exceptions.

Still think it's a great initiative though.

[–] debil@lemmy.world 5 points 3 months ago (2 children)

Yes, it's not flawless. My personal pet peeve is that there's no clear way to know if a verb is transitive or intransitive. Despite the shortcomings, it's a fun and rewarding language to learn.

[–] VitaminF 2 points 3 months ago (1 children)

At least once you know if it's intransitive or not you can make it the opposite by suffix -igi or -iĝi.

It is a neat language, especially with the history it has by now, but as much I as like it I don't think it will ever catch on widely.

And I don't think it's even possible to construct a language that's easy, consistent, and with wide appeal and adoption.

[–] debil@lemmy.world 1 points 3 months ago

Agreed. I think it could've been solved better. Although excessive use of -igi/-iĝi can make the language sound duller, so I guess it's just what it is and that's it at this point.

IMO, Esperanto could be used at schools as a "gateway language" to language learning in general. It's simple and as logical as can be in grammar and syntax. The vocabulary stems mostly from Latin based languages so learning the most common root words help students build up their vortarojn for other languages as well.

That sort of utilitarian approach to E-o, instead of the more traditional, ideological approach could bring it more popularity. But I'm no teacher so this is likely not happening.

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