Posted on 09/26/2011 12:32:44 AM PDT by nickcarraway
India has a rich linguistic history with more than 22 different national languages spoken throughout the length and breadth of the country. The 1991 census recognized 1576 mother tongues and grouped them into 114 different languages. Imagine the plight of a linguist trying to study all the languages of the country. So how does English survive in this linguistic caldroun?
India’s tryst with its “own foreign language” (English) dates back to the 17th Century, when Emperor Jahangir welcomed the East India Company into the country. Considered a language of the elite in the pre-independence era, English managed to gradually percolate down the complex, multilingual and multireligious Indian society after independence and reached its peak in the post liberalization period.
Languages almost have a biological existence, they are born, live, breathe, reach their youth and die too. English seems to be enjoying its youth in India, with the ubiquitous middle class of the country embracing the language as their own. It now serves as an integrating force and a link language which unites the country and provides a beacon of hope to youth.
India has more than 100 million English speakers, not taking into account others who can converse in English but are unable to read or write in English. It is a common site to find tourist guides in Agra fluently explaining the history of Taj Mahal in English to tourists from different parts of the world. If you are an international traveler on your maiden trip to India, you would be fascinated to see English, not Hindi (which is India’s official language), used along with the states regional language at the Railway Stations, Airports, on advertising billboards and all across the city.
Even the names of brands that sell in rural India are inscribed in English. Classes to teach
(Excerpt) Read more at communities.washingtontimes.com ...
English is the language of success.
One of the main refugia was located right there at the Pyranees Mountains ~ another on the Dalmatian coast and another in the Middle East.
Obviously there were others in the East.
DNA studies show clearly that Europe was repopulated after the Ice Age by people from the refugia.
One of the more intriguing things to come out of the earliest scientific studies of languages was that when folks migrate away from the core area their language remains fairly unchanged from what it was like at the time of migration. The changes take place back in the old homeland.
We have enough time here for European refugia speakers to have spread all the way from Spain to Scandinavia to India and then back, with their core language fairly unchanged ~ and all that before the first Indo-European drew his first swastika in the dirt near the campfire!
In the meantime the original language would have morphed into the Basque we've all come to know and love, which is a far different language than any of the Dravidian group, or the Fenno-Scandian group! It sure ain't Hungarian either.
I can honestly say I have never met someone from India that could not speak English, and we have a large population of Indians living here in the northwest. I have also never seen one on an episode of COPS. Now for are neighbors on our Southern border - well you know the answer on that one.
And who do you think you are? The Thought Police?
I was pointing out that the figures for India, though impressive are not that impressive if you consider that India was ruled by the British for more than 300 years. Several African nations, with much less colonial contact have a far higher proportion of English speakers.
What the data points to is that the Indian education system has a lot of work to do to make India more competitive.
If you had cared to read the finer details..... wikipedia also reports 350 million “english users” in India. It makes no such distinction in case of Phillipines and Nigeria. In case of Phillipines it says “66.7 million people aged 5 years or more could speak English” and in case of Nigeria “(79 million)Figures are for speakers of Nigerian Pidgin, an English-based pidgin or creole.”
That doesn’t answer the question. The truth is your username goes a long distance in an attempt to cast your regional and religious identity; something few others out here do. And then most of your responses are to posts on China - with a few grudging ones that concern purely of Africa. Don’t get me wrong - you do display knowledge of Africa. But as you’ll see my list of scalps below - I have gotten good at reading the ChiCom flow - and whether you are ChiCom or not, you are following that flow.
Do as you please and I don’t disagree with your comment on this thread but I am watching you :-) If you are ChiCom, you will slip up and I will be there to extract my scalp.
Okay, I’m a Chinese triple agent on a one man mission to destroy America. ;)
Okay, I’m a Chinese triple agent on a one man mission to destroy America. ;)
On a more serious note, I’m an African living in Africa. The reason why I post so much about China and know so much about China is because China is Africa’s largest trading partner and most dynamic player.
(More Africans are learning Mandarin than you’d imagine.)
Frankly speaking, I don’t know what keeps drawing me to this site, but I think it is important for Americans to understand how the rise of China affects their nation’s strategic position. I can see it clearly from where I live on the African continent.
Wikipedia defines the term “English users as...
“The distinction between the Speakers and Users is that Users only know how to read English words while Speakers know how to read English, understand spoken English as well as form their own sentences to converse in English.”
As for Indian education system, a large number of schools in India provide education in pure vernacular medium. Its not that they are uneducated. Its just that they have a stronger influence of vernacular language over English.
Wo ye hui shuo zhongwen, pengyou. Ruguo wo de diannao you zhongwen gongneng de hua, wo keyi gei ni xie hanzi.
China is India’s largest trading partner as well and a neighbour, but somehow we are not as start-struck with them as African Christians seem to be :-)
On a serious note, I agree with most of what you post especially how blind Americans seem to be to either extremes on China’s impact on the global system.
The strong Chinese influence of Africa isn’t fraught with risks as you may well know from past experiences. In the past Europe came with great promises of trade and development for Africa and we all know how Africa got burnt. In recent past China’s involvement in Darfur (Sudan) hasn’t really been a positive one. If you look at Asia, most of China’s close political allies such as (North Korea, Burma, Pakistan, Syria, Iran) are despotic hell holes amidst a sea of rising Asian economies. It would be prudent for Africa to strike a balance between long term political/economic interest and short term commercial interests.
the Southern parts of India remained speaking their non-Indo-European languages of Tamil/Malayalam/Kannada/Tulu/Andhra
the state of Goa had its state language as Portuguese since it was Portuguese even before the Taj Mahal was built (since 1510).
The North-East of India wasn't part of the Mughal Empire and spoke its non-European languages (belonging to the Tai or Tibeto-Burmese language families).
english is spreading across the world as it is a simple language to use. Spanish is relatively simple too, though not as simple as English. however English is getting increasingly unwieldy and is already splitting into various “dialects” — for instance if an Englishman told you that he was too knackered to snog his wife, you’d be puzzled — and it gets worse with Franglish, Spanglish, Hinglish, Chiglish etc.
To my mind, ever since blam told me about that, it seems so plausible, I'm just waiting for more archaeological proof. I already consider it true but not completely proven.
true, you’ve pointed out some of the differences between American English and British English. Of course there is also a difference between the British English of today and the British English of the Victorian/Edwardian era, which is what Indians learn!
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