TheWorld Esperantist Vegetarian Association (Esperanto:Tutmonda Esperantista Vegetarana Asocio,TEVA) is a voluntary association ofEsperanto-speaking vegetarians. Founded in 1908, the group's working language isEsperanto, and it is the oldest international organization ofvegetarians that is currently active. TEVA published a journal,Vegetarano ("Vegetarian") from 1914 to 1932, revived in 2009 asEsperantista Vegetarano, and has also operated a spirited Internetmailing list throughYahoo! Groups since 2005.
Surveys among members of theBritish Esperanto Association (1968)[1] and theGerman Esperanto Association (1992)[2] have found that there are proportionally far more vegetarians among Esperanto speakers than among non-Esperantists. Peter Forster, author ofThe Esperanto Movement, suggests that there is a general relationship between vegetarianism andpacifism—and, therefore, also between vegetarianism and Esperanto.
Already by 1893 two favourable articles about vegetarianism, had appeared inLa Esperantisto ("The Esperantist")—both later incorporated intoFundamenta krestomatio (1903),L. L. Zamenhof's basic Esperanto reader:La hejmo de la metiisto ("The home of the craftsman") andKio estas vegetarismo? "What is vegetarianism?"). A third example may also be mentioned: an article about the longevity of centenarians, which pointed out that a common factor seemed to be a largelyplant-based diet. The publication of such stories and articles suggests that Zamenhof himself had a positive attitude towards vegetarianism.
On 16 August 1908, at the FourthWorld Congress of Esperanto inDresden, Germany, the International Union of Esperantist Vegetarians (Internacia Unuiĝo de Esperantistaj Vegetaranoj, IUEV) was founded. Several years later the group changed its name to Vegetarian Esperantist League (Vegetara Ligo Esperantista, VLE). Finally, just afterWorld War II, it adopted its present name, World Esperantist Vegetarian Association (Tutmonda Esperantista Vegetarana Asocio, TEVA).
The association was founded at the instigation of René de Ladevèze. According to theEnciklopedio de Esperanto,Leo Tolstoy (himself a committed vegetarian) agreed to serve as its honorary president. According toEsperantista Vegetarano (1995, p. 23), Ludwik Zamenhof was also among the 19 founding members but requested that this not be mentioned in their vegetarian literature. This information has not been corroborated elsewhere.
Two days after the IUEV founding convention, theInternational Vegetarian Union (IVU) was established, also in Dresden, this latter group intended primarily as an association of those vegetarians who were not also Esperantist.
J. Arthur Gill, an Esperanto speaker who was secretary of aQuaker group known as theFriends Vegetarian Society, founded in 1902, had suggested that the vegetarian non-Esperantists could hold their own founding convention in connection with the earlier event and that Esperanto vegetarians could attend both events and help international understanding at the IVU's convention through the neutral medium of Esperanto. In the end, however, only a few Esperantists actually attended the IVU founding convention on 18 August 1908.
By the time of its 1913 IVU convention atThe Hague, Esperanto was one of the IVU's five official languages, along with English, French, German and Dutch.
In 1914 the first issue of the magazineVegetarano appeared, edited by EsperantistAugust Oskar Bünemann (1885–1958). From 1927 until 1932, the magazine was both a magazine for Esperantist vegetarians and an official organ of the International Vegetarian Union. In addition to Esperanto-language articles, it contained information about international vegetarianism written in English, French and German. For financial reasons, IVU stopped publishing the magazine in 1932.
In 1954,Nathan Ben Zion Havkin, founder of thePalestine-Israel Vegetarian Foundation, reorganized TEVA, which was further reawakened in 1971 byArnošt Váňa, ofSlovakia (1909–1998). He introduced a principle whereby instead of paying a fixed membership fee, members could individually decide on the amount of their annual donation. TEVA maintained this system until 2008.
In 1992 Váňa was succeeded as president byChristopher Fettes, aBriton who had become anIrish citizen. For a few years a schism resulted, as TEVA had to reconcile inconsistent records ofItalian and Slovakian membership numbers and donation receipts, and had also to resolve uncertainty as to who had been chosen as board members to represent those countries. The problems were blamed on the 85-year-old Váňa, whose health had begun to deteriorate in the last years of his life before he died in 1998. The schism was eventually healed when the membership ended Váňa's experiment, replacing his leadership through a loose collective of friends with a restored society structure properly governed by its constitution and by-laws through a democratically elected board.
Among the above-mentioned activists or supporters, four have served as honorary presidents of TEVA: Leo Tolstoy, René de Ladevèze, Nathan Ben Zion Havkin and Arnošt Váňa.
According to its constitution and by-laws, the association aims to "promote Esperanto among vegetarians and vegetarianism among Esperantists... in active and friendly and active collaboration, with the goal of respect for nature and all living beings." Its motto isVivu kaj lasu vivi ("Live and let live").
Since 2009 TEVA has published the twice-yearly magazineEsperantista Vegetarano (approx. 40 pages per issue), successor to both the previously publishedVegetarano and theLetero de la Esperantista Vegetarano supplement.
Its meetings are not arranged independently, but are usually held in conjunction with the annual meeting of theWorld Congress of Esperanto. In addition, TEVA affiliates with other Esperantist and vegetarian groups. For example, TEVA members worked at the 36thInternational Vegetarian Union convention in 2004 inFlorianópolis, Brazil, and at its 38th convention inDresden, where the IVU and TEVA jointly celebrated their 100-year jubilee.
With representatives currently in 22 countries, the group is a member of both theInternational Vegetarian Union and theEuropean Vegetarian Union, as well as being a specialized association affiliated with theWorld Esperanto Association, known by its Esperanto acronym as UEA.
In 2008, TEVA started a blog at thephoto-sharing andsocial-networking siteIpernity; in 2009 TEVA added a group of Esperantist vegetarians through the social networking companyCouchSurfing International.
During its 2008 convention inRotterdam, TEVA elected a new board of directors, comprising:
