Portal:Constructed languages/Language of the month/April 2013

is the most widely spoken constructed international auxiliary language. Its name derives from Doktoro Esperanto ("Esperanto" translates as "one who hopes"), the pseudonym under which L. L. Zamenhof published the first book detailing Esperanto, the Unua Libro, on July 26, 1887. Zamenhof's goal was to create an easy-to-learn and politically neutral language that transcends nationality and would foster peace and international understanding between people with different regional and/or national languages. Nowadays Esperanto is seen by Esperantists as an alternative to the all-in-English spreading the world. Esperanto is found as an ethical solution (for the threat about the cultural and linguistic diversity related to the expansion of English as well as an economical alternative (for foreigners the learning of Esperanto is much easier than the learning of English). Estimates of Esperanto speakers range from 10,000 to 2,000,000 active or fluent speakers, as well as perhaps a thousand native speakers, that is, people who learned Esperanto from birth as one of their native languages. Find out more...