Thierry, Dominique, Jacques Malet, and Cecile Bazin. 2016. L'evolution de l'engagement benevole associatif en France, de 2010 h 2016. Paris: France Benevolat.
Tilly, Charles. 1999. From Interactions to Outcomes in Social Movements. In How Social Movements Matter, ed. Marco Giugni, Doug McAdam, and Charles Tilly. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.
®
Check for updates
7
Mobile Youth: How Digital Media Changed Language Learning, Activism for Free Speech and the Very Experience
of Time
In 2015, a new phenomenon would bring about radical changes in Esperantujo: the popular language learning platform Duolingo launched an Esperanto course for speakers of English. This online course's imme- diate success caused a fuss: a wave of young people who, up to that point, had hardly heard of the language flooded Esperanto groups on Facebook asking questions about vocabulary or simply trying to make friends with a 'Saluton, mi lernas Esperanton per Duolingo. Kiel vi fartas?' (Hi, I'm learning Esperanto through Duolingo. How are you?).
The visibility that Duolingo gave to Esperanto culminated in the development of new spaces on digital media—mostly on two forms of digital media, namely social media and instant messaging apps—that sheltered these new speakers. This involved the rapid popularisation of YouTube channels with content in Esperanto, groups and pages on social media, podcasts, websites that pair up learners and annual campaigns from UEA and TEJO to promote the language through video.
While several Esperantists were enthusiastic about this growing use of the language, others regarded this phenomenon with suspicion. Under- standing Esperanto as 'more than a language', many regretted that this
© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive 179
licence to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2021 G. Fians, Esperanto Revolutionaries and Geeks, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030- 84230-7_7
rise in the number of speakers did not reflect an increase of Esperantists: a great number of those who come across the language online continue using it online, without joining the Esperanto movement or the regular, face-to-face enactments of Esperantujo. Learning the language more as an intellectual game than as a tool for left-wing activism, such newbies mobilised digital media in ways that older generations of association- bound Esperantists did not. If Esperantos inner idea and cosmopolitan principles are not necessarily transmitted through language learning apps and online message exchanges, then this fuss could represent not hope, but a potential death of Esperanto as association-bound Esperantists knew it.
To analyse the series of online, mostly mobile phone-based, communi- cation technologies that have transformed the Esperanto community in recent years, it is worth recalling Don Kulick's inquiry on language death in Papua New Guinea. Following for over thirty years how the speakers of Tayap slowly shifted from their native language to Tok Pisin—the most widely spoken language in the country—Kulick (1992, 2019) explores the consequences of the slow death of Tayap, starting with the question: what is left unsaid when a language dies? In Esperanto's case, following not a language shift, but a significant change in language use, a question imposes itself: what is left unsaid—or said differently—when a speech community largely moves from institutionalised, face-to-face configurations to online spaces?
This chapter explores how digital media and the emergence of the first natively digital generations of Esperanto speakers have triggered changes in the long-standing association-based Esperanto community. In this vein, the first part of the chapter delves into shifts in language use, discussing how digital natives complement their use of spoken and written language with visual cues brought by emojis, gifs, Internet memes and videos. In the meantime, engaging with the language online also entails (re)considering Esperantos language ideology regarding fairer communication through different lenses, via an emphasis on online participatory cultures and claims for free speech. The second part exam- ines a widening age cleavage in this speech community: what about those who are not equally invested on the Internet and struggle to overcome the technical barriers imposed by new technologies?
Analysing how digital media produce spaces that, unlike face-to-face gatherings, are permanently available and do not rely on regular sched- ules, I argue that digital media has prompted significant changes in people's experience of time. Fast-paced online language learning, real- time voice and text conversations and a plethora of language users from across the world constantly available online not only bring about different forms of language use, but change the very shape taken by speech communities. Hence, beginning with an inquiry into what is left unsaid when communication takes place largely online leads us to an analysis of how community mobilises digital media and how digital media mobilise community.
7.1 Fast Language Learners, Instant Users, Even Faster Texters
Created in 2012 and offering Esperanto courses since 2015, the online language learning platform Duolingo quickly gained prominence and became home to a multitude of polyglots and language lovers. Based in the United States, Duolingo proposes free foreign language lessons meant to feel 'more like a game than a textbook'. Its methodology relies on production, repetition and gamification, rather than on tradi- tional grammar-based classes, and takes inspiration from the motto 'learning is easier when you're having fun'. With activities varying from recording voice clips, matching words with images and forming sentences, Duolingo portrays language learning progression in the format of a tree, whereby learners unlock new levels (further branches of the skill tree) after successfully reaching checkpoints. Learners are also rewarded with XP (experience points) and lingots (an in-game currency used to unlock bonus levels) for each stage completed, and their achievements are displayed on public leaderboards, to encourage competition between learners. Mimicking the logic of video games, such gamified functioning (Huotari and Hamari 2012) turns language learners into game players, thus stimulating the continuous engagement of users with the platform.
Yet Duolingo is not the only platform offering Esperanto courses online. One of the pioneers was the French-medium iKurso, where several French speakers learned Esperanto online from the 1990s onwards. The early 2000s also saw the creation of the English-medium Lernu.net. However, two features set Duolingo apart from other plat- forms: it was the first to gamify Esperanto language learning, keeping people invested in the learning process until they complete the skill tree, meet the challenge and are able to say 'game over'. Additionally, Duolingo counts an app: the possibility of having lessons via the mobile phone, rather than a computer, turns language learning into an activity that can be done at anytime, in small doses every day, even as a pastime while one commutes or waits in a queue.
On the developers' end, the founders and early employers of Duolingo set up the first language courses available. Yet, once the platform was up and running, they left most of the courses' development as a task for volunteers who, gathered on Duolingo Incubator, continuously devel- oped and added more languages to the platform. This is where Esperanto gained ground: under the guidance of the North American computer scientist and Esperantist Chuck Smith, a team of volunteers collaborated to create the English-medium Esperanto course on Duolingo. Launched in 2015, the course quickly gained visibility, reaching 1,6 million learners in early 2020 (Nielsen 2020).
This figure instantly became a source of pride for many Esperan- tists, particularly those invested in the Esperanto movement, who saw it as a sign of revival of the language. By the end of 2015, Chuck Smith had been elected by La Ondo de Esperanto—a prestigious monthly Esperanto magazine—as the Esperantist of the Year, and referred to by UEA as 'la motoro de la interreta E-generacio', the driving force of the online generation of Esperantists (Valle and Vergara 2015: 241). Between 2015 and 2020, the Duolingo Esperanto course also became available for Spanish, Portuguese and French speakers, reaching 2.9 million users in early 2021.[28]