Chuck Smith (Esperantist)

Chuck Smith (born 24 June 1979)^[1] is an American Esperantist. Having learned Esperanto and joined the Esperanto movement in February 2001, Smith founded the Esperanto version of Wikipedia in November of that same year.

He was a board member of the American Esperanto youth organization — known as USEJ from its official name Usona Esperantista Junularo — and of the international youth non-profit organization E@I ("Education@Internet"). He also served as an official representative of the World Esperanto Association (in Esperanto, Universala Esperanto-Asocio, UEA) to the United Nations.

From July 2002 to January 2003, he travelled through 14 countries (Brazil, Argentina, Britain, France, Germany, Sweden, Czech Republic, Slovenia, Croatia, Serbia, Turkey, Austria, Luxembourg and the Netherlands), participating in many Esperanto-language meetings along the way. During this trip he detailed the history and progress of the Esperanto Wikipedia during a Czech conference on the application of the international language, Esperanto, in science and technology (Konferenco pri Aplikoj de Esperanto en Scienco kaj Tekniko, KAEST). This presentation prompted Miroslav Malovec to establish the Czech-language Wikipedia. From January 2003 to January 2004 he volunteered full-time at the Rotterdam central office of TEJO, the World Esperanto Youth Organization. From April 2004 to June 2004 he was a full-time employee of Esperanto Antaŭen, a group promoting Esperanto in Calgary, Canada.

As a board member for TEJO, he represented that group at the World Esperanto Association (UEA). In November 2006, he launched Eklaboru, a website to connect employers and job-seekers. In January 2007 he launched Amikumu, an interactive site to help Esperantists find new friends and upload photos. Neither site is active today.

Smith now lives in Berlin as an iOS developer. Using the nickname Amuzulo, he is currently a moderator for the team that developed the Esperanto-for-English-speakers course on Duolingo.^[2] That course has over 416,000 students, as of 7 June 2016.^[3] In 2015, he was declared the Esperantist of the Year (2015) because of his work spreading Esperanto online, chiefly because of the aforementioned activities developing and launching Duolingo's Esperanto course for English speakers.

References

External links

• Interview with Chuck Smith on Radio Polonia, 28 April 2002 (8 minutes 45 seconds)
• Esperanto Language Archive 2009–2014, Transparent Language: Chuck Smith's English-language blog postings on Esperanto.