The document discusses the history of universal languages from ancient times to the 20th century. It outlines how computation and language have been intertwined historically. In the late 19th/early 20th century, logicians pursued the goal of universal languages in parallel with establishing the foundations of mathematics. The document outlines taxonomies that have been used to classify different types of universal languages, including those based on their construction principles or degree of naturalness. It provides context on key figures involved in developing universal languages like Leibniz, Russell, and Couturat.
An alternative globalisation: Why learn Esperanto today?Federico Gobbo
Federico Gobbo presents an overview of Esperanto and why it is still relevant today. Esperanto was created in the late 19th century during a period of optimism about international cooperation and the potential for a universal language to unite Europe. While Esperanto's popularity declined after World War I, the language continues to have communities of speakers who use it both socially and to produce original cultural works. Gobbo argues that Esperanto remains valuable for its role in fostering multilingualism, as a platform for international cultural exchange, and as a symbol of an alternative form of globalization that respects diversity and human rights.
Esperanto has evolved over time from serving primarily as a universal second language to promote international understanding, to also advocating for linguistic rights and balanced multilingualism. The ideology shifted from seeing Esperanto as neutral and not intended to replace national languages, to recognizing the need to consider linguistic minorities within states and address linguistic imperialism. More recently, Esperanto is viewed as one option for international communication that can coexist with other languages, rather than being in conflict with English.
Approaches to multilingualism of Esperanto speakersFederico Gobbo
The document summarizes a sociolinguistic study of the Esperanto community conducted in Italy in 2014. The study examined Esperanto speakers' awareness and practice of linguistic diversity and multilingualism based on surveys and interviews of 93 Esperanto speakers. The key findings were that Esperanto speakers strongly support multilingualism and linguistic rights. They also have an awareness of linguistic diversity, including regional and minority languages. However, the study found a lack of a clear shared understanding among Esperanto speakers about the connections between language, power, and social justice as outlined in the 1996 Prague Manifesto.
The Religious Dimensions of the Esperanto Collective IdentityFederico Gobbo
Presentation for the Symposium "Religious dimensions of nationalism: Interdisciplinary perspectives" held at
at Fondazione Giorgio Cini, Venice, 21-22-13 October 2021.
Word order in the diachrony of Esperanto: A corpus-based study of noun-adje...Federico Gobbo
Talk given in the meeting at the University of Amsterdam of the international network on The Structure, Emergence and Evolution of Pidgin and Creole Languages (SEEPiCLa), Monday the 14th of December, 2015.
Esperanto, a language for a Global Identity Can Esperanto foster European ide...Federico Gobbo
The document discusses Esperanto and its potential to foster European identity. It provides background on Esperanto's origins in the late 19th century amidst hopes for a universal language. Esperanto communities formed across Europe and internationally. However, the two World Wars weakened the Esperanto movement. Today, Esperanto is still used by some communities and families, particularly for its ease of learning. The document describes a small pilot study the author conducted with Esperanto families living in Europe to understand their perspectives on European identity.
Translating into and out of a planned language: what does it mean?Federico Gobbo
Esperanto was established as a translation language through Zamenhof's translations of works from his native languages into Esperanto. Over time, as the Esperanto community grew, translations from many other languages helped develop the Esperanto language and literature. Early Esperantists relied heavily on source languages for translations, but the language gradually developed set expressions and idioms of its own. While new terms are still sometimes debated, translations played a key role in establishing Esperanto as a living language with its own standard register and literature.
An alternative globalisation: Why learn Esperanto today?Federico Gobbo
Federico Gobbo presents an overview of Esperanto and why it is still relevant today. Esperanto was created in the late 19th century during a period of optimism about international cooperation and the potential for a universal language to unite Europe. While Esperanto's popularity declined after World War I, the language continues to have communities of speakers who use it both socially and to produce original cultural works. Gobbo argues that Esperanto remains valuable for its role in fostering multilingualism, as a platform for international cultural exchange, and as a symbol of an alternative form of globalization that respects diversity and human rights.
Esperanto has evolved over time from serving primarily as a universal second language to promote international understanding, to also advocating for linguistic rights and balanced multilingualism. The ideology shifted from seeing Esperanto as neutral and not intended to replace national languages, to recognizing the need to consider linguistic minorities within states and address linguistic imperialism. More recently, Esperanto is viewed as one option for international communication that can coexist with other languages, rather than being in conflict with English.
Approaches to multilingualism of Esperanto speakersFederico Gobbo
The document summarizes a sociolinguistic study of the Esperanto community conducted in Italy in 2014. The study examined Esperanto speakers' awareness and practice of linguistic diversity and multilingualism based on surveys and interviews of 93 Esperanto speakers. The key findings were that Esperanto speakers strongly support multilingualism and linguistic rights. They also have an awareness of linguistic diversity, including regional and minority languages. However, the study found a lack of a clear shared understanding among Esperanto speakers about the connections between language, power, and social justice as outlined in the 1996 Prague Manifesto.
The Religious Dimensions of the Esperanto Collective IdentityFederico Gobbo
Presentation for the Symposium "Religious dimensions of nationalism: Interdisciplinary perspectives" held at
at Fondazione Giorgio Cini, Venice, 21-22-13 October 2021.
Word order in the diachrony of Esperanto: A corpus-based study of noun-adje...Federico Gobbo
Talk given in the meeting at the University of Amsterdam of the international network on The Structure, Emergence and Evolution of Pidgin and Creole Languages (SEEPiCLa), Monday the 14th of December, 2015.
Esperanto, a language for a Global Identity Can Esperanto foster European ide...Federico Gobbo
The document discusses Esperanto and its potential to foster European identity. It provides background on Esperanto's origins in the late 19th century amidst hopes for a universal language. Esperanto communities formed across Europe and internationally. However, the two World Wars weakened the Esperanto movement. Today, Esperanto is still used by some communities and families, particularly for its ease of learning. The document describes a small pilot study the author conducted with Esperanto families living in Europe to understand their perspectives on European identity.
Translating into and out of a planned language: what does it mean?Federico Gobbo
Esperanto was established as a translation language through Zamenhof's translations of works from his native languages into Esperanto. Over time, as the Esperanto community grew, translations from many other languages helped develop the Esperanto language and literature. Early Esperantists relied heavily on source languages for translations, but the language gradually developed set expressions and idioms of its own. While new terms are still sometimes debated, translations played a key role in establishing Esperanto as a living language with its own standard register and literature.
The study of the linguistic worldview in constructed languages on the example...Ida Stria
This document discusses the study of linguistic worldviews in constructed languages using Esperanto as an example. It provides an overview of linguistic worldview and definitions from literature. It then discusses Esperanto's characteristics including its constructed nature but natural development over time through use. The document outlines classifications of language development and considers whether Esperanto's community allows for analysis of linguistic worldview despite issues like its primarily L2 speakers and influence from other languages and cultures. It concludes Esperanto contains necessary elements for linguistic worldview analysis but the multilingual nature requires additional study.
The international language (called esperanto)eraonlus
1. The document discusses the issue of foreign language instruction in Italian schools becoming dominated by English alone. It argues for the introduction of a non-ethnic but truly international language like Esperanto to avoid this problem and promote multilingualism.
2. Esperanto was created in 1887 to be a universal language that could promote international communication and brotherhood. It grew rapidly in the early 20th century with international congresses and associations. While estimates of current speakers vary, Esperanto remains the most widely spoken constructed international language.
3. The document provides historical context on the many constructed language projects over centuries to achieve a universal language for international communication. Volapük and Esperanto were the most
This document summarizes the history and spread of constructed languages (conlangs) through the rise of the internet. It discusses how before the internet, conlangs required books for documentation but now spread online. It profiles several conlangs, including Klingon spreading beyond Star Trek fans, Tolkien's Elvish languages studied academically, and auxiliary languages like Esperanto, Ido and Interlingua finding new communities online through Wikipedia. The internet revived lesser-known conlangs and gave smaller conlang communities new ways to organize through virtual meetings.
The document describes two language laboratories conducted in a Montessori school in Milan. In the first laboratory, students invented a variant of Europanto, a linguistic pastiche, focusing on vocabulary from different languages. In the second laboratory, students invented a secret language called Markuskica, starting with phonology and morphology. They extracted words from Italian and other languages, added affixes to change meaning, and developed paradigms for new words. The goal of both laboratories was to increase students' metalinguistic awareness of their multilingual repertoire.
The document discusses deliberate metaphors in Esperanto and building a cosmopolitan culture from planned languages. It provides context on interlinguistics as the science of planned languages. Specifically, it examines the role of L.L. Zamenhof, the founder of Esperanto, in planning the language to be used orally by a community as an international auxiliary language. It notes challenges for planned languages to develop orality compared to natural languages, and how Esperanto culture is currently being built.
The document summarizes a study conducted in a middle school in Orosei, Sardinia to test the use of the Limba Sarda Comuna (LSC) written standard in classrooms. Sardinian is an endangered language that is being replaced by Italian. The study used the CLIL method to teach Sardinian history lessons in both the local variety and written LSC. Preliminary research found students had varying Sardinian abilities. The classroom activities found that LSC was effective and did not cause issues, with some improved results. A follow up survey found students comfortable with LSC and interested in further Sardinian instruction. The study supports introducing LSC in schools to help maintain the language.
Towards a tool to analyze linguistic justice: Essential interdisciplinary par...Federico Gobbo
Presentation at the X Days Language Rights "Valutare le politiche linguistiche: Quali obiettivi, criteri, indicatori?" JDL2016 / GDL2016 University of Teramo, 14-16 dec 2016.
Is Esperanto a contested language? Towards a multifaceted de nition of contes...Federico Gobbo
This document discusses the contested status of Esperanto in Italy through a case study. It provides background on Esperanto, describing it as the most developed planned language with a stable community of speakers where transmission is mostly voluntary. It then summarizes the history of the Esperanto movement in Italy, including its origins among non-Italians, Catholics, and intellectuals. Over time, Italy saw both neutral and left-wing Esperanto movements, and the language faced challenges gaining recognition from academia and the public. Today, Esperanto organizations in Italy focus on local classes, events, and twinning towns while facing external challenges to its status as a "real" language.
Interlinguistics in the 21st century: Planned languages as a tool to learn li...Federico Gobbo
This document discusses interlinguistics and the use of planned languages as a tool for learning linguistics. It describes how interlinguistics sits between general linguistics and other external fields like sociolinguistics. The document outlines some definitions and discusses how most societies have been oral rather than literate. It notes two exceptions where writing came before speech: sign languages and planned languages. The document discusses different types of planned languages and their purposes. It presents interlinguistics and working with planned languages as an innovative teaching tool, where students elaborate on existing language sketches in small groups.
Interlinguistics is the study of planned languages designed for international communication between speakers of different native languages. It emerged in the 17th century from the works of philosophers John Wilkins, René Descartes, and Gottfried Leibniz. In the late 19th century, planned languages like Volapük were created to facilitate global trade and commerce. The Auxiliary Language Movement in 1900 promoted languages like Latino Sine Flexione and Esperanto gained popularity after its first international congress in 1905. Planned languages can be categorized as a priori or a posteriori depending on whether their vocabulary is based on existing languages. Interlinguistics traces its origins to
Diversity in CLIL in Plurilingual Communities of Practice
CLILの多様性と複言語コミュニティー
On January 26, 2019, the above symposium took place at Sophia University. Celebrating the presence of honorable speakers, Professors Henry Widdowson and Barbara Seidlhoffer of the University of Vienna, Professor Kumiko Murata of Waseda University, Professors Kensaku Yoshida and Makoto Ikeda of Sophia University, 226 researchers and teachers attended the event.
There are a few key factors that determine whether a language becomes a dialect or a new language over time. A slight separation of a community can lead to dialect formation, while a long-term separation is more likely to result in a new language. The reasons for a community's separation, such as social mandates, natural disasters, social strife, or economic conditions, often explain how the new language develops lexically, stylistically, and structurally over time. Even after separating, a new language will typically retain characteristics of the original parent language it derived from.
This document discusses the relationships between English as a medium of instruction (EMI), content and language integrated learning (CLIL), and English as a lingua franca (ELF). It notes that while there has been significant research on EMI and CLIL in Japan, less attention has been paid to ELF. The document then critiques some assumptions in linguistics, second language acquisition research, and language education policy about concepts like native speakers and competence. It argues that a new conceptualization of global English that sees it as a lingua franca, not the property of any one country or people, is needed.
From Esperanto to Dothraki: languages as works of art and why they matterFederico Gobbo
This document discusses the creation of constructed languages like Esperanto and Dothraki. It provides background on Zamenhof, who created Esperanto in 1887 to be a universal second language. It then discusses the creation of Dothraki for the TV show Game of Thrones, describing how David Peterson was commissioned to develop the language starting from minimal source material provided by George R.R. Martin. It explains some of Peterson's linguistic processes for developing Dothraki grammar, vocabulary, and pronunciation based on the source texts.
The document discusses reading strategies in foreign languages. It defines key reading strategies like skimming, scanning, and detailed reading. It also discusses the importance of prior knowledge and intertextuality when reading. Inferencing is defined as drawing conclusions from given data. Using dictionaries is recommended as a last resource when other contextual clues have been exhausted.
The text then discusses English as an international language. It notes that English is widely taught and used even in countries with little British influence historically. It was previously taught using British English models, but American English has become more influential since World War 2 due to US economic and cultural power. However, different varieties of English may gain prominence in the future from countries like India.
Linguistic imperialism imposes the ideology of dominant languages over native languages through education and social norms. It promotes the dominant language in schools, workplaces, and society in general, privileging those who speak the imperial language. This can diminish native languages and cultural identity. The document discusses how English has become dominant in Argentina through education policy and social practices, despite Spanish being the official language. It argues teachers should promote linguistic diversity and cultural identity rather than reproduce linguistic hierarchies.
This document discusses the history of diachronic linguistics in the 19th century. It explores how early linguists viewed languages through a historical lens and were influenced by mechanistic physics and biological evolution theories. Two influential paradigms emerged: the family tree theory proposing languages evolve in a branching pattern, and the wave theory arguing innovations spread between languages. The document also describes how languages were classified based on their treatment of meaning units in words.
Interlinguistics and Esperanto Studies in the new MillenniumFederico Gobbo
Interlinguistics and Esperanto Studies in the new millennium focuses on three areas:
1) The history and philosophy of international auxiliary languages (IALs) like Esperanto, examining ideas of internationality and neutrality over time.
2) Linguistic analyses of Esperanto including morphology, syntax, and sociolinguistic studies of its use and community. Constructive Adpositional Grammars provide a framework.
3) The relationship between Esperanto and artificial intelligence, as Esperanto was used in early machine translation experiments and is now supported by tools like Google Translate.
The International language (called Esperanto)eraonlus
MINISTRY OF ITALIAN PUBLIC INSTRUCTION
International Language (known as Esperanto) Commission, Interministerial Decree April 29/October 5 1993
STUDY
Published in the Official Bulletin of the Italian Ministry of Public Instruction, no. 21-22, May 25-June 1, 1995: p. 7-43
Foreward
1. The International Language
1.1. Official recognition
1.2 The International Language as introductory linguistic language
1.2.1 Pedagogic Experiments
1.3 Conclusion
2. Proposals
Bibliography
Notes
The study of the linguistic worldview in constructed languages on the example...Ida Stria
This document discusses the study of linguistic worldviews in constructed languages using Esperanto as an example. It provides an overview of linguistic worldview and definitions from literature. It then discusses Esperanto's characteristics including its constructed nature but natural development over time through use. The document outlines classifications of language development and considers whether Esperanto's community allows for analysis of linguistic worldview despite issues like its primarily L2 speakers and influence from other languages and cultures. It concludes Esperanto contains necessary elements for linguistic worldview analysis but the multilingual nature requires additional study.
The international language (called esperanto)eraonlus
1. The document discusses the issue of foreign language instruction in Italian schools becoming dominated by English alone. It argues for the introduction of a non-ethnic but truly international language like Esperanto to avoid this problem and promote multilingualism.
2. Esperanto was created in 1887 to be a universal language that could promote international communication and brotherhood. It grew rapidly in the early 20th century with international congresses and associations. While estimates of current speakers vary, Esperanto remains the most widely spoken constructed international language.
3. The document provides historical context on the many constructed language projects over centuries to achieve a universal language for international communication. Volapük and Esperanto were the most
This document summarizes the history and spread of constructed languages (conlangs) through the rise of the internet. It discusses how before the internet, conlangs required books for documentation but now spread online. It profiles several conlangs, including Klingon spreading beyond Star Trek fans, Tolkien's Elvish languages studied academically, and auxiliary languages like Esperanto, Ido and Interlingua finding new communities online through Wikipedia. The internet revived lesser-known conlangs and gave smaller conlang communities new ways to organize through virtual meetings.
The document describes two language laboratories conducted in a Montessori school in Milan. In the first laboratory, students invented a variant of Europanto, a linguistic pastiche, focusing on vocabulary from different languages. In the second laboratory, students invented a secret language called Markuskica, starting with phonology and morphology. They extracted words from Italian and other languages, added affixes to change meaning, and developed paradigms for new words. The goal of both laboratories was to increase students' metalinguistic awareness of their multilingual repertoire.
The document discusses deliberate metaphors in Esperanto and building a cosmopolitan culture from planned languages. It provides context on interlinguistics as the science of planned languages. Specifically, it examines the role of L.L. Zamenhof, the founder of Esperanto, in planning the language to be used orally by a community as an international auxiliary language. It notes challenges for planned languages to develop orality compared to natural languages, and how Esperanto culture is currently being built.
The document summarizes a study conducted in a middle school in Orosei, Sardinia to test the use of the Limba Sarda Comuna (LSC) written standard in classrooms. Sardinian is an endangered language that is being replaced by Italian. The study used the CLIL method to teach Sardinian history lessons in both the local variety and written LSC. Preliminary research found students had varying Sardinian abilities. The classroom activities found that LSC was effective and did not cause issues, with some improved results. A follow up survey found students comfortable with LSC and interested in further Sardinian instruction. The study supports introducing LSC in schools to help maintain the language.
Towards a tool to analyze linguistic justice: Essential interdisciplinary par...Federico Gobbo
Presentation at the X Days Language Rights "Valutare le politiche linguistiche: Quali obiettivi, criteri, indicatori?" JDL2016 / GDL2016 University of Teramo, 14-16 dec 2016.
Is Esperanto a contested language? Towards a multifaceted de nition of contes...Federico Gobbo
This document discusses the contested status of Esperanto in Italy through a case study. It provides background on Esperanto, describing it as the most developed planned language with a stable community of speakers where transmission is mostly voluntary. It then summarizes the history of the Esperanto movement in Italy, including its origins among non-Italians, Catholics, and intellectuals. Over time, Italy saw both neutral and left-wing Esperanto movements, and the language faced challenges gaining recognition from academia and the public. Today, Esperanto organizations in Italy focus on local classes, events, and twinning towns while facing external challenges to its status as a "real" language.
Interlinguistics in the 21st century: Planned languages as a tool to learn li...Federico Gobbo
This document discusses interlinguistics and the use of planned languages as a tool for learning linguistics. It describes how interlinguistics sits between general linguistics and other external fields like sociolinguistics. The document outlines some definitions and discusses how most societies have been oral rather than literate. It notes two exceptions where writing came before speech: sign languages and planned languages. The document discusses different types of planned languages and their purposes. It presents interlinguistics and working with planned languages as an innovative teaching tool, where students elaborate on existing language sketches in small groups.
Interlinguistics is the study of planned languages designed for international communication between speakers of different native languages. It emerged in the 17th century from the works of philosophers John Wilkins, René Descartes, and Gottfried Leibniz. In the late 19th century, planned languages like Volapük were created to facilitate global trade and commerce. The Auxiliary Language Movement in 1900 promoted languages like Latino Sine Flexione and Esperanto gained popularity after its first international congress in 1905. Planned languages can be categorized as a priori or a posteriori depending on whether their vocabulary is based on existing languages. Interlinguistics traces its origins to
Diversity in CLIL in Plurilingual Communities of Practice
CLILの多様性と複言語コミュニティー
On January 26, 2019, the above symposium took place at Sophia University. Celebrating the presence of honorable speakers, Professors Henry Widdowson and Barbara Seidlhoffer of the University of Vienna, Professor Kumiko Murata of Waseda University, Professors Kensaku Yoshida and Makoto Ikeda of Sophia University, 226 researchers and teachers attended the event.
There are a few key factors that determine whether a language becomes a dialect or a new language over time. A slight separation of a community can lead to dialect formation, while a long-term separation is more likely to result in a new language. The reasons for a community's separation, such as social mandates, natural disasters, social strife, or economic conditions, often explain how the new language develops lexically, stylistically, and structurally over time. Even after separating, a new language will typically retain characteristics of the original parent language it derived from.
This document discusses the relationships between English as a medium of instruction (EMI), content and language integrated learning (CLIL), and English as a lingua franca (ELF). It notes that while there has been significant research on EMI and CLIL in Japan, less attention has been paid to ELF. The document then critiques some assumptions in linguistics, second language acquisition research, and language education policy about concepts like native speakers and competence. It argues that a new conceptualization of global English that sees it as a lingua franca, not the property of any one country or people, is needed.
From Esperanto to Dothraki: languages as works of art and why they matterFederico Gobbo
This document discusses the creation of constructed languages like Esperanto and Dothraki. It provides background on Zamenhof, who created Esperanto in 1887 to be a universal second language. It then discusses the creation of Dothraki for the TV show Game of Thrones, describing how David Peterson was commissioned to develop the language starting from minimal source material provided by George R.R. Martin. It explains some of Peterson's linguistic processes for developing Dothraki grammar, vocabulary, and pronunciation based on the source texts.
The document discusses reading strategies in foreign languages. It defines key reading strategies like skimming, scanning, and detailed reading. It also discusses the importance of prior knowledge and intertextuality when reading. Inferencing is defined as drawing conclusions from given data. Using dictionaries is recommended as a last resource when other contextual clues have been exhausted.
The text then discusses English as an international language. It notes that English is widely taught and used even in countries with little British influence historically. It was previously taught using British English models, but American English has become more influential since World War 2 due to US economic and cultural power. However, different varieties of English may gain prominence in the future from countries like India.
Linguistic imperialism imposes the ideology of dominant languages over native languages through education and social norms. It promotes the dominant language in schools, workplaces, and society in general, privileging those who speak the imperial language. This can diminish native languages and cultural identity. The document discusses how English has become dominant in Argentina through education policy and social practices, despite Spanish being the official language. It argues teachers should promote linguistic diversity and cultural identity rather than reproduce linguistic hierarchies.
This document discusses the history of diachronic linguistics in the 19th century. It explores how early linguists viewed languages through a historical lens and were influenced by mechanistic physics and biological evolution theories. Two influential paradigms emerged: the family tree theory proposing languages evolve in a branching pattern, and the wave theory arguing innovations spread between languages. The document also describes how languages were classified based on their treatment of meaning units in words.
Interlinguistics and Esperanto Studies in the new MillenniumFederico Gobbo
Interlinguistics and Esperanto Studies in the new millennium focuses on three areas:
1) The history and philosophy of international auxiliary languages (IALs) like Esperanto, examining ideas of internationality and neutrality over time.
2) Linguistic analyses of Esperanto including morphology, syntax, and sociolinguistic studies of its use and community. Constructive Adpositional Grammars provide a framework.
3) The relationship between Esperanto and artificial intelligence, as Esperanto was used in early machine translation experiments and is now supported by tools like Google Translate.
The International language (called Esperanto)eraonlus
MINISTRY OF ITALIAN PUBLIC INSTRUCTION
International Language (known as Esperanto) Commission, Interministerial Decree April 29/October 5 1993
STUDY
Published in the Official Bulletin of the Italian Ministry of Public Instruction, no. 21-22, May 25-June 1, 1995: p. 7-43
Foreward
1. The International Language
1.1. Official recognition
1.2 The International Language as introductory linguistic language
1.2.1 Pedagogic Experiments
1.3 Conclusion
2. Proposals
Bibliography
Notes
This document provides a brief history of linguistics. It discusses how linguistics emerged as a field of study separate from philosophy in the 18th century. Important early linguists included Sir William Jones, who pointed out similarities between Sanskrit and European languages, suggesting a common origin. In the 19th century, linguistics focused on the historical development and evolution of languages. Ferdinand de Saussure was influential in the 20th century with his ideas of langue and parole and viewing language as a system. Structural linguistics developed in America under Franz Boas, Edward Sapir, and Leonard Bloomfield, focusing on rigorous empirical description of languages. Later theorists like Firth and Halliday emphasized studying language in its social
Sujay Laws of Language Dynamics FINAL FINAL FINAL FINAL FINAL.pdfSujay Rao Mandavilli
This document provides a historical overview of the development of linguistics as a field of study. It discusses early experiments on language acquisition in ancient Egypt and medieval Europe. It notes that linguistics developed independently in China and India before contact with Western traditions, with important early works in Sanskrit grammar, Tamil grammar, and Chinese dictionaries. The document then outlines key contributions from Greek, Roman, medieval Arabic and European scholars between the 1st century BC and 18th century AD. It concludes by noting the structuralist, formalist and behaviorist shifts in linguistics in the early 20th century.
Sujay Laws of Language Dynamics FINAL FINAL FINAL FINAL FINAL.pdfSujay Rao Mandavilli
This document provides a comprehensive overview of the history of linguistics. It discusses how linguistics evolved from early studies of language dating back to ancient Sumeria and Egypt, through developments in ancient Greece, Rome, China, and India. It outlines some of the earliest known experiments on language acquisition in the 7th century BC. The document then discusses the growth of linguistic studies and key figures throughout the medieval period, Renaissance, 18th century, and 19th century, including important developments like the reconstruction of Proto-Indo-European. It concludes by noting the major shift towards structuralism, formalism and behaviorism in linguistics in the early 20th century.
Hollywood Languages: The Challenge of Interlinguistics in the New MillenniumFederico Gobbo
This document discusses the discipline of Interlinguistics and attempts to define it. It explores several potential definitions: as an autonomous branch of linguistics, as a branch of language planning, as similar to creolistics or the study of interlanguages. The document also discusses definitions that view Interlinguistics as the study of conscious human intervention in languages or as contrastive linguistics. It provides context on the history and development of Interlinguistics and examples of planned or constructed languages.
The document provides a summary of the history of language teaching methods from ancient times to the late 20th century. It describes several influential methods and theorists throughout history including the Grammar Translation Method, Direct Method, Audiolingual Method, and Natural Approach. Key developments include a shift from translation-based approaches to an emphasis on oral communication, and a progression from conscious learning of rules to a focus on unconscious acquisition through comprehensible input.
This document provides a brief history and overview of 20th century linguistics. It summarizes the contributions of key figures like Saussure, Jakobson, and members of the Prague School. Saussure introduced important concepts like langue and parole and viewed language as a system of signs. Jakobson helped spread Saussure's ideas and merged them with structural anthropology. The Prague School founded a non-historical approach and looked at how structural components contributed to the entire language.
This document provides an overview of planning languages and language planning. It discusses key topics like:
- The definition of interlinguistics and how it relates to language planning.
- The history and origins of language planning as a field and how it involves activities like status, acquisition, corpus, and structure planning.
- Examples of planned languages and an overview of the comparative text used to analyze different planned language systems.
The document discusses several key topics in linguistics:
1. Linguistics is the scientific study of language, examining its nature, structure, units, and modifications. It emerged in the 19th century to emphasize a newer approach focusing on spoken language compared to traditional philology.
2. Philology refers to the study of written records, establishing their authenticity and meaning. It involves reconstructing imperfect texts by comparing variants and interpreting information about history, culture, language and literature.
3. Linguistics can be divided into descriptive/synchronic versus historical/diachronic approaches, theoretical versus applied areas, and micro- versus macrolinguistics. Various specialized fields within macrolinguistics are
The History of Language Teaching MethodologyGeovanny Peña
This document provides a brief history of language teaching methods from ancient times to the present. It discusses how Latin and Greek were traditionally taught with a focus on grammar rules and memorization. In the 16th-18th centuries, French and Italian replaced Latin as commercial languages. The 19th century saw the development of new methods like the Grammar Translation Method and Reform Movement seeking more oral and naturalistic approaches. The document also outlines the contributions of various theorists and developers of new methods.
This document discusses the principle of linguistic relativity and how different scholars have approached it over time. Some key points:
- Linguistic relativity holds that a language can influence other aspects of life and must be considered. However, scholars have differed on whether to affirm or deny its importance.
- Each of the world's thousands of languages is distinct in sounds, words, grammar, etc. But they all share tremendous diversity.
- Scholars like Boas rejected the idea that language determines thought or that language, culture and cognition are necessarily linked. However, they acknowledged that language shapes habitual thought.
- Later scholars like Sapir and Whorf further explored how language influences thought, though their views have
The document discusses English as a member of the Indo-European language family. It explains that English originated from a prehistoric ancestor language called Proto-Indo-European. Over thousands of years, Proto-Indo-European split into various dialects that evolved into the modern Indo-European languages. While English retains the basic structure of its Germanic origins, it has borrowed extensively from other Indo-European languages like Latin, Greek, and its Germanic neighbors. As a result, over half of the basic roots found in the reconstructed Proto-Indo-European language are now represented in Modern English vocabulary through borrowing.
1. Discourse analysis has its origins in classical rhetoric but declined as an academic discipline. It reemerged in the 1960s through structuralist analyses of narratives, myths, and forms of communication across disciplines like anthropology, linguistics, and semiotics.
2. In the mid-1960s, structural analyses of discourse were published that applied structural linguistics to literature, film, and other cultural forms. This sparked interest in systematically studying language use, discourse, and communication across fields.
3. By the early 1970s, discourse analysis was emerging as a new interdisciplinary field drawing from functional linguistics, text linguistics, and approaches studying indigenous narratives, conversation, and other genres.
English is the most widely spoken language globally and is used as an official or secondary language in about 75 territories, home to one third of the world's population. Due to its widespread use, there are many variations and standards of English. The development and spread of English throughout the world occurred in phases, from the 15th century when it was largely confined to Britain, through the colonial era when it spread through colonization, to the current era where it is learned globally as a lingua franca rather than through imperial domination. There is ongoing debate around whether a distinct variety of English is emerging across Europe to serve as a common language, referred to as "Euro-English".
J.R (John Rupert) Firth was born in Keighley, Yorkshire, England on June 17, 1890. He attended the local grammar school.
After which he studied at Leeds University, obtaining his BA and MA in history. He also briefly taught history at a Leeds teacher training college.
He was influenced by many great linguists for their great ideas and theories. Therefore, he decided to take part in the field of linguistics for the sake of improvements in his ideas related to language.
He was an English linguist, the first professor of general linguistics in Great Britain. He is famous for his ideas on phonology and the study of meanings.
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1. From Universal to Programming Languages
F. Gobbo1 H. Durnov´a2
1Universiteit van Amsterdam
F.Gobbo@uva.nl
2Masaryk University
helena.durnova@mail.muni.cz
CiE 2014 — 23rd June 2014
3. Computation, language and computation
History of computation and history of language and communication
are intertwined from the early days, as reflected in common etymology
of words like:
Spanish contar ‘to narrate’ and ‘to compute’;
German z¨ahlen ‘to calculate’ and erz¨ahlen ‘to narrate’;
etc.
Also, the word ‘language’ is used abundantly in contemporary CS:
SQL, for Structured Query Language;
XML, for eXtensible Markup Language;
PSL, for IEEE 1850 Standard for Property Specification Language;
etc.
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4. The use of ‘language’ in CS
All programming language are different from human languages, being
being taylored for human-machine and machine-machine information
exchange.
This analogy is put forward borrowing other terms used in linguistics,
such as syntax and semantics of programming languages.
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5. Lesson learnt from the road from Leibniz to Turing
The history of the origins of modern computation is an attempt to
reduce ambiguity in semantics and redundancy in syntax via
formal, non-natural languages.
For instance, George Boole introduced his laws of human thought
through an example in English (quoted in Martin Davis’ book):
iff x alone stands for “white things,” and y for sheep, let xy
stand for “white sheep;”
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6. Purposes of our paper
Thesis: the quest of universality in languages proceeded in parallel
with the foundation of computation. In the late 1950s, computer
programmers were looking for their own Esperanto with ideals and
enthusiasm similar to the earlier attempts to find a universal language
for human communication.
Case study: Esperanto, the most widely known attempt to establish a
universal language, in its metaphorical use by computer specialists.
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9. Outline
Universal languages and the scientific revolution
Logicians and Universal Languages in the 20th century
Taxonomies of universal languages
7 / 31
10. Outline
Universal languages and the scientific revolution
Logicians and Universal Languages in the 20th century
Taxonomies of universal languages
The Case-Study of Esperanto in Computer Science
7 / 31
11. Outline
Universal languages and the scientific revolution
Logicians and Universal Languages in the 20th century
Taxonomies of universal languages
The Case-Study of Esperanto in Computer Science
Machine Translation and Esperanto
7 / 31
13. The importance of Real Characters
The discovery of the ancient Egyptian and Chinese civilizations
greatly influenced English philosophers of the 17th century. Bacon
studied hieroglyphs and Chinese writing, formulating the concept of
real characters (in Rossi 2000):
artificially constructed characters, whose significance depended
only on a custom or usage which was arbitrarily established (ad
placitum) and agreed upon ‘as though by a silent pact’
(tanquam pacto tacito recepti)
Real characters form an artificial language free from semantic
ambiguities: characters represent reality directly as concepts instead
of sounds.
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14. Philosophical languages are perfect and universal
Philosophical languages are artificial and share two features:
1. internal perfection, crystal clear shape, described in logical terms,
2. external universality, being neutral in ethnic and cultural terms.
The most influent ones were proposed by:
Francis Lodowick,
George Dalgarno,
John Wilkins,
Comenius.
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15. The two destinies of Leibniz
Leibniz called his philosophical language universal characteristic
(characteristica universalis), in direct contrast with Wilkins’ real
characters. In other words, symbols (‘characters’) should represent
the alphabet and calculational tools of human thinking, which is
‘universal’ instead of ‘real’. Martin Davis claims that Leibniz’s idea
influenced logicians such as George Boole and Gottlob Frege,
eventually giving the foundations of Hilbert’s programme.
However, even if Leibniz’s ‘general language’ (lingua generalis) was
composed in 1678, his work deeply influenced European
mathematicians and logicians only after the publication of previously
unknown works, in 1903.
11 / 31
17. Paris, 1900
In the year 1900, Paris hosted:
the international congress of mathematicians, where Hilbert
presented his programme;
the international congress of philosophy.
There were three people who attended both events:
Bertrand Russell,
Louis Couturat,
Giuseppe Peano.
13 / 31
18. Two research programmes in parallel
Russell (by far the youngest of the three) got acquainted with the
mathematical logic of Peano and his school.
Couturat presented the movement for the adoption of an international
auxiliary language to the community of philosophers as the
descendant of the ideas of Leibniz and the English philosophers of the
17th century.
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19. Louis Couturat
In the years 1900-1907 Couturat was active in the Esperanto
movement, and in that period he gathered the support of 310
academic and professional societies, and 1,250 university professors
and scholars.
He led this support through a Delegation, which decided that
Esperanto should be reformed in order to be adopted as the definitive
form of the international auxiliary language.
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20. Couturat and his correspondents
Couturat exchanged a lot of letters with important colleagues of his
time: Gottlob Frege, Henri Poincar´e, ´Emil Borel.
Fortunately, Couturat’s correspondence with Russell and Peano
survived almost complete on both sides, and thus we can see that two
main topics were common in both exchanges of letters: first, logic
and the foundations of mathematics, second, international auxiliary
languages.
16 / 31
21. The years 1908-1914
Russell’s correspondence with both Couturat and Peano dwindled in
1908. In those years, Russell was probably heavily involved in working
on the monumental work Principia Mathematica with A. N.
Whitehead. Also, he was sceptical about the auxiliary language
movement pursued by the others:
In 1908, Peano published the last edition of his Formulario
Mathematico, written in Latino sine Flexione, a simplified version
of Latin heavily influenced by Leibniz’s lingua generalis;
17 / 31
22. The years 1908-1914
Russell’s correspondence with both Couturat and Peano dwindled in
1908. In those years, Russell was probably heavily involved in working
on the monumental work Principia Mathematica with A. N.
Whitehead. Also, he was sceptical about the auxiliary language
movement pursued by the others:
In 1908, Peano published the last edition of his Formulario
Mathematico, written in Latino sine Flexione, a simplified version
of Latin heavily influenced by Leibniz’s lingua generalis;
Couturat formed a movement in support of Ido, a reform of
Esperanto, claiming it to be the result of the work by the
Delegation.
17 / 31
24. The taxonomy by Couturat and Leau
In 1903 Couturat and Leau collect the universal languages published
until that time in a monumental survey, according to the following
categories:
a-priori languages are the artificial languages built over one or
more abstract principles of construction following the Baconian
idea of “real characters” already illustrated above;
19 / 31
25. The taxonomy by Couturat and Leau
In 1903 Couturat and Leau collect the universal languages published
until that time in a monumental survey, according to the following
categories:
a-priori languages are the artificial languages built over one or
more abstract principles of construction following the Baconian
idea of “real characters” already illustrated above;
mixed languages borrow some structures from human languages,
as for instance in Volap¨uk, the first international auxiliary language
to be used in practice;
19 / 31
26. The taxonomy by Couturat and Leau
In 1903 Couturat and Leau collect the universal languages published
until that time in a monumental survey, according to the following
categories:
a-priori languages are the artificial languages built over one or
more abstract principles of construction following the Baconian
idea of “real characters” already illustrated above;
mixed languages borrow some structures from human languages,
as for instance in Volap¨uk, the first international auxiliary language
to be used in practice;
a-posteriori languages borrows ther structures from an existing
natural language: e.g., Zamenhof’s Esperanto, Couturat’s Ido,
Peano’s Latino sine Flexione.
19 / 31
27. The taxonomy by Lyons
The linguist John Lyons proposed four ordered degrees of naturalness
of languages:
natural1 are conform with nature: French, Arabic, etc. are
implicitly classified here;
20 / 31
28. The taxonomy by Lyons
The linguist John Lyons proposed four ordered degrees of naturalness
of languages:
natural1 are conform with nature: French, Arabic, etc. are
implicitly classified here;
natural2 are constrained by nature, i.e., they are species-specific:
in Chomskyan terms, all instances of the Universal Grammar;
20 / 31
29. The taxonomy by Lyons
The linguist John Lyons proposed four ordered degrees of naturalness
of languages:
natural1 are conform with nature: French, Arabic, etc. are
implicitly classified here;
natural2 are constrained by nature, i.e., they are species-specific:
in Chomskyan terms, all instances of the Universal Grammar;
natural3 are acquired by humans as a normal part of the process
of maturation and socialization: e.g, sign languages such as the
American Sign Language (ASL) and the British Sign Language
(BSL);
20 / 31
30. The taxonomy by Lyons
The linguist John Lyons proposed four ordered degrees of naturalness
of languages:
natural1 are conform with nature: French, Arabic, etc. are
implicitly classified here;
natural2 are constrained by nature, i.e., they are species-specific:
in Chomskyan terms, all instances of the Universal Grammar;
natural3 are acquired by humans as a normal part of the process
of maturation and socialization: e.g, sign languages such as the
American Sign Language (ASL) and the British Sign Language
(BSL);
natural4 refers to the theory of language built over the language
instead of the language itself (e.g., Montague).
20 / 31
31. Artificiality as degrees of unnaturality
Following Lyons’ taxonomy, two kind of “artificial” languages can be
found:
unnatural1,2,3 comprise the ones designed by logicians,
mathematicians and computer scientists:
21 / 31
32. Artificiality as degrees of unnaturality
Following Lyons’ taxonomy, two kind of “artificial” languages can be
found:
unnatural1,2,3 comprise the ones designed by logicians,
mathematicians and computer scientists:
post-Baconian a-priori universal languages;
21 / 31
33. Artificiality as degrees of unnaturality
Following Lyons’ taxonomy, two kind of “artificial” languages can be
found:
unnatural1,2,3 comprise the ones designed by logicians,
mathematicians and computer scientists:
post-Baconian a-priori universal languages;
Boolean and predicate calculi;
21 / 31
34. Artificiality as degrees of unnaturality
Following Lyons’ taxonomy, two kind of “artificial” languages can be
found:
unnatural1,2,3 comprise the ones designed by logicians,
mathematicians and computer scientists:
post-Baconian a-priori universal languages;
Boolean and predicate calculi;
all Turing-complete programming languages;
21 / 31
35. Artificiality as degrees of unnaturality
Following Lyons’ taxonomy, two kind of “artificial” languages can be
found:
unnatural1,2,3 comprise the ones designed by logicians,
mathematicians and computer scientists:
post-Baconian a-priori universal languages;
Boolean and predicate calculi;
all Turing-complete programming languages;
unnatural4 comprise:
21 / 31
36. Artificiality as degrees of unnaturality
Following Lyons’ taxonomy, two kind of “artificial” languages can be
found:
unnatural1,2,3 comprise the ones designed by logicians,
mathematicians and computer scientists:
post-Baconian a-priori universal languages;
Boolean and predicate calculi;
all Turing-complete programming languages;
unnatural4 comprise:
Couturat and Leau’s a-posteriori languages such as Esperanto;
21 / 31
37. Artificiality as degrees of unnaturality
Following Lyons’ taxonomy, two kind of “artificial” languages can be
found:
unnatural1,2,3 comprise the ones designed by logicians,
mathematicians and computer scientists:
post-Baconian a-priori universal languages;
Boolean and predicate calculi;
all Turing-complete programming languages;
unnatural4 comprise:
Couturat and Leau’s a-posteriori languages such as Esperanto;
Quasi-Natural Languages (QNL) commonly constructed by linguists
by deliberately their changing structural properties for experimental
purposes.
21 / 31
39. The roots of CS and Esperanto
Computer scientists looking for their own roots tend to say that the
theoretical foundations of Computer Science were posed in the same
period of the debate launched by Couturat, alongwith the first
reflections on Artificial Intelligence. Two cases:
in 1915 the Spanish scientist Leonardo Torres y Quevedo – an
active Esperantist – invoked a new science called automatique
(French word for ‘automatics’), where an idea of artificial
intelligence was proposed;
23 / 31
40. The roots of CS and Esperanto
Computer scientists looking for their own roots tend to say that the
theoretical foundations of Computer Science were posed in the same
period of the debate launched by Couturat, alongwith the first
reflections on Artificial Intelligence. Two cases:
in 1915 the Spanish scientist Leonardo Torres y Quevedo – an
active Esperantist – invoked a new science called automatique
(French word for ‘automatics’), where an idea of artificial
intelligence was proposed;
Quevedo influenced Norbert Wiener, the founder of Cybernetics,
whose father, Levi Wiener, had been a Warsaw Gymnasium
schoolmate of Zamenhof, the founder of Esperanto, and himself an
active Esperantist in the 1930s.
23 / 31
41. Machine translation and Esperanto
One of the pioneers of mechanical translation is the Soviet Union
scientist Petr Petrovich Smirnoff-Troyanskii: in 1933 he obtained a
Soviet patent for a mechanical machine for translation. He borrowed
the symbols of parsing from Esperanto. His work remained unknown
in the Western countries for many decades.
In a project called Distributed Language Translation (DLT) Esperanto
played a key role. DLT was succesfully funded by Europe for a
feasibility study in the years 1982-3. The engine was programmed in
Prolog. A prototype was presented in 1987, while English and French
were the natural language involved, the translation engine was based
on Esperanto.
24 / 31
43. A Universal Language of programming?
The situation of computer programmers in the mid-1950s was
somewhat similar to the situation of scientists at international
congresses at the turn of the 20th century. The dynamics of the group
of computer scientists working on ALGOL 60 resembles the Esperanto
movement at that time.
In 1955, in Darmstadt, computing specialists from various countries
agreed that they needed to communicate more efficiently – sharing
computer programs between different computers.
In 1957, the American ACM (Association for the Computing
Machinery) and the German GAMM (Gesellschaft f¨ur angewandte
Mathematik und Mechanik) prepared proposals for a Universal
Language of programming.
26 / 31
44. Towards a new Babel of programming languages
This ‘international algebraic language’ should make programming
easier. The effort eventually led to support ALGOL: in a lecture to
undergraduates in 1960, Anton´ın Svoboda – the Czechoslovak
computer pioneer – named ALGOL the “Programmer’s Esperanto”, a
language every programmer should learn.
In 1961 Ginsburg and Rice proved that ALGOL is not an unicum but
rather a member of a family of formal, artificial languages. Their
computational power - equivalent to a universal Turing machine – will
be guaranteed by their description in terms of context-free grammar
expressed via the Backus-Naur normal form.
27 / 31
46. A history of failures. . .
The struggle for a perfect, universal language – both in the case of
humans and machines – is doomed to fail:
today, the de facto international language is English.
instead of having one definitive programming language computer
programmers should choose among thousands.
29 / 31
47. ...is not a failure in itself
The story of the search of the perfect language is the story of a
dream and of a series of failures. Yet that is not to say that the
story of failures must itself be a failure. (Umberto Eco)
Without the dream of the universal language, perhaps side-effects
would not be found.
30 / 31