The progress of my Esperanto is having more and more slow phases at the moment. It is hard to find the time to read, study and use the language when it is one I of course don’t really use on a day to day basis. The internet has been invaluable, therefore, particularly interaction with the seemingly increasing community of Esperantists on Google+ where I have over five hundred people in my Esperanto circle.
It’s in this arena that some speakers have developed the idea of encouraging ourselves to use Esperanto in social media more and more, and this has culminated in Esperanto-Monato (Esperanto Month), or EOMO for short. The idea is that throughout November participants will use Esperanto exclusively or as much as possible on social media platforms, as a way of making the language more instant and everyday. If we can’t use it as a main language in “real” life, why not try to do so for a spell in online life?
It will partly be a good way of demonstrating Esperanto’s value as an everyday international language which is easy, fun and rewarding to use, and may also give non-speakers a chance to see just how logical and understandable it can often be.
But mainly it will be good practice to use it more spontaneously and practically on social media. Instead of tweeting a thought or a joke in English, why not force myself to do so in Esperanto? Rather than post a piece of news on Facebook (which I increasingly rarely do) why not try to write it in Esperanto and perhaps learn a couple of difficult words along the way? And if I’m posting a lot in Esperanto in Google+ then it’s a useful step to push myself into making it my primary language in that platform.
So I’ve decided that my participation in Esperanto-Monato will manifest itself in the following ways:
On Google+ I’ll post entirely in Esperanto, and do so publicly rather than just in my Esperanto circle which those not in it won’t see.
On Twitter, I’ll try to tweet primarily in Esperanto, though won’t promise not to occasionally tweet something here and there in English.
On Facebook, which as I say I am using less and less, I’ll go fully Esperanto.
I haven’t yet decided whether I will blog exclusively in Esperanto for the month, though this may not be an issue as things are very busy at the moment for me and there’s not much time for writing much in any language right now. I do have a couple of ideas for blog posts in Esperanto, though, so there might be a few appearances of the langauge over November.
Comments or replies on any of the above to other people’s posts in English, will of course, be in English. It would just be confusing otherwise.
EOMO will be an interesting experiment. I might not manage, I might put off or annoy people who don’t speak the language, or alternatively I might end up really enjoying it, really valuing the practice, and deciding never to post in English again (though I seriously doubt that!).
It’s only for a month, though, so time will tell.
