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Esperanto Revolutionaries and Geeks pp 207–237Cite as

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We Have Never Been Universal: How Speaking a Language Becomes a Prefigurative Practice

Abstract

This chapter unpacks what Esperanto means to its speakers and how they render the language useful through everyday practices of horizontal knowledge exchange, fairer international communication and alternative travelling. This discussion invites the reader to think about what anthropology gains and what it loses in emphasising discussions on prefiguration, as well as what the Esperanto community gains and loses with the present-oriented, prefigurative approaches carried out by Esperantists. Concentrating on prefigurative politics and challenging the bibliography on the success of social movements, I argue that the Esperanto movement is only sustainable insofar as the language does not become a de facto world language. Esperanto’s wide adoption would turn it into another hegemonic language, and such ‘success’ would, ultimately, mean the failure of the language.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    Such as the members of the political party EDE (Europe-Democracy-Esperanto), which attempts to gather support for Esperanto within the framework of the political institutions of the European Union (see Fians 2018).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Anthropology, University of Brasília, Brasília, Brazil

    Guilherme Fians

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  1. Guilherme Fians
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Fians, G. (2021). We Have Never Been Universal: How Speaking a Language Becomes a Prefigurative Practice. In: Esperanto Revolutionaries and Geeks. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-84230-7_8

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-84230-7_8

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