language in india3
Post on 08-Apr-2018
237 Views
Preview:
TRANSCRIPT
-
8/7/2019 Language in India3
1/49
LANGUAGE IN INDIA
Strength for Today and Bright Hope for Tomorrow
Volume 4 : 10 October 2004
Editor: M. S. Thirumalai, Ph.D.
Associate Editors: B. Mallikarjun, Ph.D.
Sam Mohanlal, Ph.D.
B. A. S harada, Ph.D.
A. R. Fatihi, Ph.D.
HOME PAGE
AN APPEAL FOR SUPPORT
We are in need of support to
meet expenses relating to
some new and essential
software, formatting of articles
and books, maintaining and
running the journal through
hosting, correrspondences,
etc. If you wish to support this
voluntary effort, please send
your contributions toM. S. Thirumalai
6820 Auto Club Road Suite
C
FIXING THE LANGUAGE,
FIXING THE NATION
Nandita Ghosh, Ph.D.
1. With the eruption of local and regional
separatist movements, the decade of
the 1980s in India was a period of
violence that questioned its viability as
a nation. Language conflicts between
communities became one of the central
issues under debate. In these debates,
journalists, writers, and fictional
characters bemoan the many futile
attempts of Indian leaders to promote
one national language that will imagine
a unified community of speakers who
will perhaps articulate the nation. Theirdiscussions revealed the way in which
such attempts get embroiled in what
might be called the language fix: the
national language, a unifying language
of state, must be technologically
developed andauthentically Indian. A
paradox emerges in these debates with
the supposed need for technology and
authenticity: although many Indianlanguages have developed a scientific
vocabulary, none can significantly
displace the power of English in its
privileged relations with technology. At
Send your articles
as an attachmentto your e-mail to
thirumalai@bethfel.org.
28/11/2010 Language in India
languageinindia.com//fixinglanguage1 1/49
-
8/7/2019 Language in India3
2/49
MN 55438, USA.
Also please use the
AMAZON link to buy your
books. Even the smallest
contribution will go a long way
in supporting this journal.
Thank you. Thirumalai, Editor.
BOOKS FOR YOU TO READ
AND DOWNLOAD
A LINGUISTIC STUDY
OF ENGLISH
LANGUAGE
CURRICULUM AT THE
SECONDARY LEVEL IN
BANGLADESH - A
COMMUNICATIVE
APPROACH TO
CURRICULUM
DEVELOPMENTby
Kamrul Hasan, Ph.D.
COMMUNICATION VIA
EYE AND FACE in
Indian Contexts by
M. S. Thirumalai, Ph.D.
COMMUNICATION
VIA GESTURE: A
STUDY OF INDIAN
CONTEXTS by M. S.
Thirumalai, Ph.D.
CIEFL Occasional
Papers in Linguistics,
Vol. 1
Language, Thought
and Disorder - Some
the same time, as a British import,
English is often perceived to be
inauthentic. I examine a body of fiction
and journalism from the 1980s that
engages in this paradox.
2. These works critique the governments
attempts to resolve this paradox byconstructing a unified formula of
translation through the Three-
Language Formula. This formula
mandated that those in educational
institutions, media, industry, and
administration learn English and Hindi
as the two official languages; it also
provided for the optional learning of
Sanskrit, Urdu, or another regional
language. This formula was still
unsatisfactory because regional
communities perceived their language
to be in third place to English and
Hindi in importance and market value.
The fictional and journalistic narratives
I discuss accuse the government of
creating this formula to control
linguistic conflicts and to pay lip
service to multilingualism. Whatbecomes evident through these
narratives is that after failing to
standardize a national language, the
government attempts to standardize a
linguistic practice of translation by
trying to control the way in which
translation is to occur between
communities and to fix the value of
each linking language. Easytranslations, after all, would
consolidate the power of the ruling
middle class.
3. The idea of an unproblematic
translation lies at the heart of middle-
class ideology. Within the discursive
realms of received paradigms and
categories of substantiated analysis,
Antonio Gramsci and Partha
Chatterjee both provide insightful
analyses of the rise of middle-class
power in the twentieth century.
28/11/2010 Language in India
languageinindia.com//fixinglanguage1 2/49
-
8/7/2019 Language in India3
3/49
ass c os ons y
M. S. Thirumalai, Ph.D.
English in India:
Loyalty and Attitudes
by Annika Hohenthal
Language In Science
by M. S. Thirumalai, Ph.D.
Vocabulary Education
by B. Mallikarjun, Ph.D.
A CONTRASTIVE
ANALYSIS OF HINDI
AND MALAYALAM
by V. Geethakumary, Ph.D.
LANGUAGE OF
ADVERTISEMENTS
IN TAMIL
by Sandhya Nayak, Ph.D.
An Introduction to
TESOL:
Methods of Teaching
English
to Speakers of OtherLanguages
by M. S. Thirumalai, Ph.D.
Transformation of
Natural Language
into Indexing Language:
Kannada - A Case Study
by B. A. Sharada, Ph.D.
How to LearnAnother Language?
by M.S.Thirumalai, Ph.D.
Verbal Communication
with CP Children
by Shyamala Chengappa,
Ph.D.
and M.S.Thirumalai, Ph.D.
Bringing Order
to Linguistic Diversity
- Language Planning in
the British Raj by
Gramsci explains the relations between
intellectuals, bourgeois (middle-class)
hegemony, and the State. In his
opinion, the intellectuals "are the
dominant groups deputies" enabling
"the spontaneous consent given by
the masses" to their dominance and
disciplining those who resist (SPN12).Partha Chatterjee is greatly influenced
by Gramsci in his own formulations
about a British-created, subordinate,
Indian middle class (Nation and its
Fragments 35).[1] In his opinion, this
class facilitated colonial rule by acting
as buffer between the British and the
masses; its middleness was crucial to
the nationalist project. As Chatterjeepoints out, it is true that this
intermediary class, predominantly
urban and upper-caste, inherited
power from the British. It attempted to
move between differing linguistic-
cultural spaces through a link language
in order to establish its own hegemony.
English frequently functions as one of
the primary link languages for the ruling
middle class because of its colonial
history, global currency, and
predominance in technology,
administration, and communications.
4. By the mid-eighties, the Indian middle
class expanded to include new groups
and attempted to consolidate its
position within the nation. This
expanding class provided a largernational audience for Indian writers in
English. It is during this time that the
English-language novel acquired a
distinct identity. A number of writers
living within India or in various
diasporas were published by foreign
presses and consequently enjoyed
metropolitan, global audiences. Anita
Desais In Custody (pub. 1984) isperhaps the most visible internationally.
Partap Sharmas Days of the Turban
(pub. 1986) and Upamanyu
Chatterjees English August: An
28/11/2010 Language in India
languageinindia.com//fixinglanguage1 3/49
-
8/7/2019 Language in India3
4/49
Ranjit Singh Rangila,
M. S. Thirumalai,
and B. Mallikarjun
REFERENCE MATERIAL
Lord Macaulay and
His Minute on
Indian Education
In Defense of
Indian Vernaculars
Against
Lord Macaulay's Minute
By A Contemporary of
Lord Macaulay
Languages of India,
Census of India 1991
The Constitution of India:
Provisions Relating to
Languages
The Official
Languages Act, 1963
(As Amended 1967)
Mother Tongues of India,
According to
1961 Census of India
BACK ISSUES
FROM MARCH 2001
FROM JANUARY 2002
INDEX OF ARTICLES
FROM MARCH, 2001
- SEPTEMBER 2004
INDEX OF AUTHORS
AND THEIR ARTICLES
FROM MARCH, 2001
- SEPTEMBER 2004
E-mail your articles and book-
length reports to
thirumalai@bethfel.or , or
Indian Story (pub. 1988) circulate
within a predominantly European and
Indian market. Mahasweta Devis
Imaginary Maps (Bengali pub. 1989,
English pub. 1995) has a special
status. It has been translated into
English by Gayatri Spivak and studied
in most North American universities.
5. These novelists appropriate the
tradition of literary realism in their
fiction, a tradition that evolved in the
18th and 19th centuries in Britain with
the rise of the middle class. In
accordance with this tradition, which
makes truth claims in its representation
of contemporary society, these
narratives are organized around
middle-class experiences that are
presented as quintessentially Indian.
The protagonists assume that their
middleness can enable them to speak
for every group of the nation, an
assumption that gets disproved when
they confront marginalized men and
women from other communities. What
we see in the journalistic narratives issimilar to the fiction. Since these
novels, newspaper reports, and journal
articles are written in English, the
language often fails as the master code;
instead of linking different regions, it
reveals missing links in
communication.[2] Some of these
writers, journalists, and fictional
characters participate in consolidatingmiddle-class power by universalizing
its worldview against a context of
secessionist violence, while others
expose and deconstruct the hegemony
of this class.[3] These writers,
journalists, and fictional characters are
then recipients of the bourgeois values
associated with the liberal humanist
vision of a modern nation. Each workof fiction and journalism, therefore,
refracts through its medium the
process by which this vision of the
nation and a certain kind of middle-
28/11/2010 Language in India
languageinindia.com//fixinglanguage1 4/49
-
8/7/2019 Language in India3
5/49
send your floppy disk
(preferably in Microsoft
Word) by regular mail to:
M. S. Thirumalai
6820 Auto Club Road, Suite
C.,
Bloomington, MN 55438
USA.
Contributors from South Asia
may send their articles to
B. Mallikarjun,
Central Institute of Indian
Languages,
Manasagangotri,
Mysore 570006, India or e-
mail to
mallikarjun@ciil.stpmy.soft.net
Your articles and booklength
reports should be written
following the MLA, LSA, or
IJDL Stylesheet.
The Editorial Board has the
right to accept, reject, or
suggest modifications to the
articles submitted for
publication, and to make
suitable stylistic adjustments.
High quality, academic
integrity, ethics and morals are
expected from the authors and
discussants.
Copyright 2004M. S. Thirumalai
class authority get challenged in the
1980s through the discursive field of
contested and conflicting languages.
This article then seeks to explore the
language fix by examining, in separate
sections of this paper, the paradox
inherent in the desire for a
technologically developed linguisticcode that will also be authentically
national. This paradox leads to the
creation of a linguistic formula that fails
in its attempts to render each national
context perfectly transparent. This
failure makes visible subaltern subjects
that refuse to be inscribed within the
middle-class discourse of the nation
and present their own narratives.
6. One of the arenas in which missing
links in the link language and the
precariousness of middle-class
authority get revealed is media debates
over the need for a technologically
developed language. In these debates,
most journalists support government
policy, which, in their opinion, has
been guided by the idea that a nationallanguage possessing a technical
vocabulary can provide scientific
information which will facilitate rural
and urban development.[4] Practically
all of them either comment upon or
bemoan the fact that this need for
technology places English at an
advantage over all other Indian
languages.[5] In their opinion, Hindicannot compete with English. It lacks
sufficient publications dispensing
advanced scientific and educational
information. Technically qualified
Indians read and write predominantly
in English. Efforts at developing a
technical vocabulary have ignored
word resources in dialects, created
"lifeless and impractical" words, andinefficiently coordinated these between
various Hindi-speaking regions
(Mishra 23). As a result, "different
states use different words for the same
28/11/2010 Language in India
languageinindia.com//fixinglanguage1 5/49
-
8/7/2019 Language in India3
6/49
English word. Lack of uniformity in
usage is a bewildering fact of the Hindi
world" (Mishra 24). It is for such
reasons that these journalists declare
Hindi to be unable to face the multiple
challenges of modernity: " . . . it must
be emphasized that being able to buy
oranges on the railway platform [inHindi] does not equip one to . . .
cope with the modern world --
although such coping is theoretically
certainly possible in Hindi" (Masica
11). This is because "knowledge of the
kind of Hindi necessary for serious
discourse" is not being imparted in
India (Masica 10). They argue that
English can no longer be wiped out ofIndia. English-speaking Indians
"constitute the third largest pool of
trained, scientific manpower in the
world" (Masica 13).
7. The story of English in India is indeed
connected to the story of
modernization, technological change,
and middle-class power. Since the
industrial revolution in Britain, Englishhas had a privileged relationship with
science and technology. With the
expansion and consolidation of the
British empire in the two previous
centuries and America's position in the
world market in this century, English
has become the global language of
communication. British imperialism
exposed the subcontinent to thetechnological discoveries wrought by
the industrial revolution and the
capitalist market economy. The British,
who used these technologies for
colonial governance, built much of the
modernizing infrastructure. Anticolonial
resistance and the national government
used the same technologies for
purposes of creating and controllingmodern India. English, associated with
such infrastructure and technology, has
been an integral part of Indian life since
1947. It is obvious from their
28/11/2010 Language in India
languageinindia.com//fixinglanguage1 6/49
-
8/7/2019 Language in India3
7/49
assumptions that these journalists
uphold Nehru's vision of technology,
industrialization, and scientific research
as tools for modernizing and
restructuring the nation. They see an
increased English usage as an indelible
part of such changes.
8. Lachman Khubchandani, a participant
in and metacommentator on these
debates, characterizes this modernizing
impulse within the journalists and the
nationalist bourgeoisie as a desire to
have their speech globally recognized
as technologically developed. In his
opinion, this desire arises from their
perceptions that indigenous languages
are deficient communications systems
not historically linked with technology
precisely because they feel their nation
is disadvantaged as a newcomer to the
global market (International Social
Science Journal 169). As part of the
ruling middle class in India, these
journalists certainly desire to compete
and survive in the global market. In
their desire to modernize and globalize,they encounter English as the only
feasible language for modernization
because of its globally utilized,
technologically developed vocabulary;
yet, since the upper-middle class has
more access to English than do lower
classes, promoting English only
promotes their class interests. These
news/journal articles of the eightiesconsciously or unconsciously reveal
these class interests at work in
consolidating power.
9. The novels also show English as the
global language of modernization and
technology at national and international
levels. In In Custody, Hindi is not a
well-funded, marketable subject at the
Lala Ram Lal College as compared to
biochemistry. Deven, the Hindi
lecturer, makes less money than his
former colleague Vijay Sud, who had
28/11/2010 Language in India
languageinindia.com//fixinglanguage1 7/49
-
8/7/2019 Language in India3
8/49
won a scholarship to study
biochemistry in Indiana, USA. In
Mirpur, Sud is the epitome of success,
"teaching in a state university, earning a
big salary, having a big house, doing
well" (185). Most other Hindi lecturers
in Deven's department feel that they
"took up the wrong subject" instead oftaking "something scientific, something
American" like physics, chemistry,
microbiology, or computer technology
with which they could "have a future"
(186). All of these subjects are
equated with the scientific and the
technological, capable of inducing
modernizing transformations in society.
It is not an accident that these subjectsare taught primarily in English, while
Hindi is not perceived in this novel to
be participatory in nation-building
activities.
10. However, by comparison to the
news/journal articles of the eighties, the
fictional works reveal deeper
contradictions in the phenomena
regarding the relations of English withother Indian languages and technology.
Although English is indeed more
deeply entrenched in India and more
globally dominant than ever before, it
is also displaced at local and regional
levels by other languages. Such
displacements question the journalistic
assumptions discussed earlier in this
section about Englishs specialrelations with technology.By 1989,
most Indian languages develop their
technical vocabularies at local and
regional levels; commercial, media-
based, communicational, educational,
and industrial exchanges were
happening increasingly in the relevant
local language. The fictional texts
reveal some of these complexities.
11. In Imaginary Maps, certain English
words commonly used by most
Indians refer to the ways in which
28/11/2010 Language in India
languageinindia.com//fixinglanguage1 8/49
-
8/7/2019 Language in India3
9/49
everyday life has been transformed by
the technological innovation of the
railway system: "train," "junction,"
"billboard," "engine," "station," "driver,"
etc. These words have been
appropriated by the local languages of
Seora, Kuruda, and Pirtha villages
through a process of rewritten spellingsand vernacularized pronunciations.
Such words, borrowings from English,
also become part of the languages that
appropriate them. This is one of the
methods by which Indian languages
acquire a technical vocabulary to cope
with modernization. Similar
appropriations are evident in Days of
the Turban. In Jagtara, Balbir'svillage, the official business of banking,
finance, and administration is
conducted in multiple exchanges
between English, Hindi, and Punjabi.
No one language has an especially
developed technological vocabulary
that can adequately convey the
complex requirements of modernity to
this rural community. Therefore, there
are missing links in all of these
languages. For example, the green
revolution in agriculture happens
through scientific farming, knowledge
of which is primarily available through
the English language. In Jagtara,
however, most farmers are either
illiterate or literate Punjabi speakers,
with some knowledge of Hindi and
little fluency in English. Informationabout farm technology is available to
varying extents in Punjabi and Hindi;
both languages either create new
vocabularies to convey this information
or borrow and appropriate words
from English. In their conversations,
these farmers translate between
Punjabi, Hindi, and English; their
translations frequently break downcausing confusions in meaning. Perfect
links between cultures and languages
are not possible, nor is it possible to
have English link all regions through its
28/11/2010 Language in India
languageinindia.com//fixinglanguage1 9/49
-
8/7/2019 Language in India3
10/49
access to technology.
12. Under such conditions, the adivasi
subaltern is exploited because of a
complex of reasons. In "Pterodactyl,
Pirtha, and Puran Sahay" (Imaginary
Maps), the adivasis at Pirtha die of
food poisoning caused by thecontamination of herbs and roots with
insecticides. Harisharan, a government
official in Pirtha, reports to Puran, a
journalist, "We have not brought
scientific health care to the tribals. If
something happens beyond the limits
of their knowledge they think of
mysterious reasons, divine rage, the
witch's glance, and so on" (123).
Adivasis are unable to help themselves
because they do not know what
causes their deaths -- an ignorance
based on their inability to access a
language containing scientific
information. Scientific, legal, and
technological information is available to
some extent in most Indian languages
as well as English. Their own language
is not officially patronized in the sameway and therefore is subalternized not
only by English but also by Hindi and
other regional languages. Being
poverty stricken and lower caste, most
adivasis cannot afford an education in
any of these languages because it is
expensive. Class exclusions are
reinforced by language exclusions;
each feeds off the other.Theirexclusion from mainstream languages
incapacitates them from representing
their interests to government officials
and bargaining for the funds set aside
for their welfare.
13. It is not possible to argue that English
has a privileged relationship with
technology because it is inherently
techno-friendly or that it is the only
possible language for modernization.
Modernization has affected all Indian
languages in uneven and chaotic ways.
28/11/2010 Language in India
languageinindia.com//fixinglanguage1 10/49
-
8/7/2019 Language in India3
11/49
Most regional languages have
developed their own technical
vocabulary and are used by the local
media, industry, education systems,
and administration. English retains its
power because of its historical and
colonial positioning. However, each
language displaces and is displaced bythe other at every level of exchange in
the nation. Each displacement reveals
the missing links in the link languages;
neither English, nor Hindi or any other
language can completely represent
every communication between
different regions and locations. In these
missing links, middle-class power
fluctuates and middle-class pretentionsof speaking for the nation get ruptured.
14. The middle classes often perceive the
need for a national language to be
technologically developed, a
perception that makes them think of
English as the only suitable language
for modernization. This perception
contradicts their desire for authenticity
because, for many members of thisclass, English is foreign and therefore
inauthentic. This contradiction allows
no single language to meet the
paradoxical requirements for
technology and authenticity. Conflicts,
premised upon this desire for
authenticity, have arisen over English,
Hindi, Urdu, and other languages in the
years following independence.[6] TheThree Language Formula, created by
the government to resolve these
conflicts, moves away from the idea of
a single national language to
acknowledge the multilingualism of
India. However, it also attempts to
predetermine the nature of translations
between linguistic contexts. These
attempts are fueled by an uneasymiddle-class ideology that assumes its
middleness can enable it to speak for
every context within the nation.
However, any link language used by
28/11/2010 Language in India
languageinindia.com//fixinglanguage1 11/49
-
8/7/2019 Language in India3
12/49
the ruling middle class debunks all
claims for authenticity while operating
between contexts because it becomes
at once authentic or inauthentic in these
translations.
15. The inherent contradictions in all
concerns for authenticity are wellillustrated by Homi Bhabha's concept
of hybridity. [7] Bhabha discusses the
deconstructive implications of spaces
outside of a pedagogical knowledge
that constructs itself as authentic,
rational, and universal. These hybrid
spaces exist between unequal,
antagonistic sites without clear cut
boundaries. In his opinion, any
utterance from such a space focuses
attention on the particular time and
place of a speaking subject, challenges
principles of rationality, revises settled
hierarchies, and institutes a dialogic
process that reveals how power is
constructed and the subaltern
marginalized. All languages operate
within this Bhabhaesque hybrid space
in India. They enter unequal,antagonistic, identity-defining, dialogic
relationships with each other.
16. Indian English embodies such hybridity
because it is simultaneously
deconstructive and maintaining of
status quo. It is not quite foreign nor
quite indigenous. It is difficult to
eradicate because of its connectionwith global capital and pan-Indian,
upper-middle-class power. Because of
its technological value, unifying-
fragmenting effects, and authentic-
inauthentic quality, it is the impossible
national language. Yet it is frequently
constructed as the only possible
language for modernity. English in
India disorients the authenticating
claims of every other language. It
reveals the powermongering desires
behind such claims. For example, the
second half ofEnglish August's title
28/11/2010 Language in India
languageinindia.com//fixinglanguage1 12/49
-
8/7/2019 Language in India3
13/49
refers to "an Indian story": "District
administration in India is largely a
British creation, like the railways and
the English language, another complex
and unwieldy bequest of the Raj. But
Indianization (of a method of
administration, or of a language) is
integral to the Indian story" (10). Thisstory is constituted by the prominence
of English existing in complex and
combative relations to other languages.
These novels and news/journal articles
attempt to talk about local and regional
experiences through the apparently
pan-Indian medium of English. Yet in
the act of translation, they confront the
untranslateable. English as themastercode is inadequate in conveying
local and regional cultures. This
untranslatability of English becomes a
topic of discussion for journalism as
well as a motivating problem for the
fiction.
17. In English August, the official national
discourse on the validity of English as a
link language in India is presented bySrivastav, Agastya's boss. Srivastav, a
civil servant educated in Hindi, asserts
that English in India is not only useful
as an administrative tool but also
authentic by virtue of its usefulness. As
part of an expanding middle class, he
desires to use English to administer the
country, broker power, and share the
class privileges enjoyed by Englishspeakers: "the English we speak is not
the English we read in English books. .
. . Our English should be just a vehicle
of communication . . . how we speak
should not matter as long as we get the
idea across" (59). He desires that this
administrative language should be
absolutely transparent in order to
facilitate interegional translations ofculture, information, and resources.
Srivastav therefore upholds the validity
of Indian English because it represents
the hybrid influences that shape identity
28/11/2010 Language in India
languageinindia.com//fixinglanguage1 13/49
-
8/7/2019 Language in India3
14/49
politics in India within the postcolonial
context: "You are what you are, just as
English here too is what it is, an
unavoidable leftover. We can't be
ashamed of our past, no, because that
is to be ashamed of our present" (60).
He would like to accept the presence
of Indian English as an indelible part ofcolonization without dwelling on the
complexities of its hybridity in order
that he can use English to link different
regions. However complete
transparency is impossible because
English is fractured from within; not
everyone speaks the same English.
18. The novel presents many instances
when English fails to link different
contexts. Agastya, the protagonist,
goes to St. Stephens College, a
colonial institution, where he studies
English literature. He and his friends
are the "English type[s]," or Indians " .
. . who speak English more fluently
than [they] speak any Indian language"
(23). When he is posted as a
government officer to Madna, a smalltown in Central India, he is unable to
communicate intellectually with fellow
officers, who speak a different English
with a heavier vernacular accent.
Agastya's English professor, Dr.
Upadhyay, experiences a similar
redundancy; he complains of having to
teach Shakespeare and Conrad in
Hindi to uncomprehending students.Dr. Upadhyay reacts to their
incomprehension by opining that
"English in India is burlesque" (24)
because it only poorly mimics an
authentic British English. He is unable
to accept the different kinds of English
his students speak. He homogenizes
the many Englishes spoken by different
classes in Britain. He is also unawarethat language at all times can only be a
mimicry of itself.[8] In contrast to
Agastya and Dr. Upadhyay, the
inhabitants of Madna, mostly farmers,
28/11/2010 Language in India
languageinindia.com//fixinglanguage1 14/49
-
8/7/2019 Language in India3
15/49
adivasis, local merchants, and
politicians, speak the "occasional tell
tale . . . English phrase" creating a
hybrid language that reshapes English
(18). In these acts, they challenge the
hegemony of Agastya's class power
and inhabit an in-between
Bhabhaesque space created by theirencounter with the modernizing effects
of postcolonial bureaucracy,
technology, and communication.
19. What is interesting about such
encounters is that these challenges do
not only occur between the middle and
the working class but within the middle
class itself. Agastya, Dr. Upadhyay,
Srivastav, and even some of the
Madnaites would broadly fall within
the middle class. This class is
obviously divided by differences in
lifestyles caused by income, rural and
urban contexts, and access to English.
Srivastava, Agastya, and Dr.
Upadhyay desire complete
transparency in English when
communicating outside their immediatecontexts because they feel paralyzed
by its failure as a link language;
questions of authenticity can only arise
within the context of missing links in
the link language. This hybridization of
English is therefore threatening.
Agastya characterizes this hybridity as
an "amazing mix . . . Hazaar fucked.
Urdu and American, a thousandfucked, really fucked . . . nowhere else
could languages be mixed and spoken
with such ease" (1). Perhaps what is
truly "fucked" about such hybridization
is that it reveals what Spivak terms
"the deconstructive embrace of a
postcolonial identity" which unsettles
the hegemony of a certain section of
the English-speaking ruling class(Imaginary Maps, xxxi). In contrast,
the "pure" idiom affected by the latter
through either a Sankritized Hindi or
the "purified" English that Upadhyay
28/11/2010 Language in India
languageinindia.com//fixinglanguage1 15/49
-
8/7/2019 Language in India3
16/49
desires reveals neocolonialist
exploitation in the middle-class desire
to appropriate resources to safeguard
power.
20. This fractured nature of identity politics
surrounding hybridity is also evident in
the journalistic discourse of theeighties. For some journalists writing at
the time, the idea of an Indianized
English is desirable because English
helps them translate their cultural
capital across the country. Shyam
Ratna Gupta lists the different forms of
English: "kitchen-butler English" as
used by domestic servants; the school
or college version replete with regional
overtones, sloppy grammar, and a
debased curricula; professional English
which is jargonized but communicates
effectively; and literary English which is
competitive and influenced by
advances in print technology
(Hindustan Times 9). N.
Krishnamurthy provides a narrative of
the progressive appropriation of
English in India, making it unique andvalid.[9] Khushwant Singh celebrates
how Hindustani and English borrowed
words from each other, which were
"pressed into shape to form Indian
English" (Hindustan Times 9). Singh
provides examples of Indian poets like
Gieve Patel, Keki N. Daruwallah, and
Nissim Ezekiel who use this fusion of
languages in their poetry. Similarly,K.D. Sethna argues that the native
tongue cannot always be defined in
terms of nationality (Mother India
651-71).[10] He claims that Indians
can successfully write in English
because "The English language is the
most composite in the world. . . . It
has the capacity to assimilate
everything, it can take any hue ofthought, shade of suggestion, glow of
feeling, pattern of experience and turn
them into truly English effects -- that is,
effects achieved with perfect adequacy
28/11/2010 Language in India
languageinindia.com//fixinglanguage1 16/49
-
8/7/2019 Language in India3
17/49
by English words" (659). When he
promotes the concept of the essential
adaptability of English to any culture to
justify its validity in India, he ignores
the fact that all languages are
adaptable and that English is a global
language because of British and U.S.
imperialism. Raja asserts: "If we canuse English with some confidence why
should we not speak in English? If we
feel that we are at home in English,
why should we not write in English?"
(Mother India 374) Gupta,
Krishnamurthy, Raja, and Sethna write
for different newspapers. Khushwant
Singh is also a novelist in English who
has helped the nationalistreconstruction of English as an Indian
product. These middle-class journalists
write for different sections of the
middle class but share each other's
assumptions about the process of
Indianization of English.
21. This process can best be explained
through Bakhtin's idea of "the dialogic
orientation of a word among otherwords" (The Dialogic Imagination
275). According to Bakhtin, any
linguistic utterance takes "meaning and
shape at a particular historical moment
in a socially specific environment"
(276). In Bakhtin's terms, the word in
any language exists in a "difficult to
penetrate" "elastic environment" made
up of other, alien words (276). Whenany word is used to express an idea or
describe an object, it encounters other
words about the same idea or object,
which then become "overlain with
heteroglot social opinion," "charged
with value," and "open to dispute." In
this dialogic interaction with this
tension-filled environment, the word
gets into "complex interrelationships"with other words, "merges with some,"
and "recoils from others." The word
and utterance in any language shape
themselves in this dialogic process. In
28/11/2010 Language in India
languageinindia.com//fixinglanguage1 17/49
-
8/7/2019 Language in India3
18/49
colonial and postcolonial India, English
words and phrases became part of
other Indian languages precisely
through this dialogic interaction. The
process was creative, inventing a new
form of English and reinfusing Indian
languages with new vocabulary and
meaning.
22. This Bakhtinian process of hybridity is
also filled with violence and
displacements between languages,
causing misgivings among other
journalists of the eighties. A. Naseer
Khan considers English to be a foreign
import for it is not widely spoken by a
majority of Indians and cannot "pull
out [from] under our feet the carpet of
our past heritage, particularly the
carpet of a composite culture"
(Seminar, 34). He is supported by
R.G.K., who declares that English
damages the psyche, hinders progress,
and creates a hybrid culture that is
derivative in nature (Times of India
/Sunday Review, V). Both Khan and
R.G.K. are obviously influenced by thenotion that English not only creates
class distinctions among Indians but
also represents impure western values
that threaten to corrupt and erase an
authentic Indian self. They feel that
non-English speakers are unable to
translate themselves outside of their
contexts; hence, such a language
prevents them from competingadequately for the resources of the
nation. Khan and R.G.K. attempt to
construct a monolithic idea of
Indianness that is defined against
foreign domination. However, this
image gets fractured at several levels:
first, when confronted with the hybrid
Anglo-Indian identity, created by the
interaction between British and Indianculture; second, when confronted with
the Muslim identity, created through
Islamic invasions of the Middle Ages;
and third, when confronted with
28/11/2010 Language in India
languageinindia.com//fixinglanguage1 18/49
-
8/7/2019 Language in India3
19/49
scheduled castes and tribes who are
not considered to have pure Aryan
ancestry.
23. In the novel English August,
Agastya's hybridity makes visible the
fractured nature of identity politics in
which these journalists get embroiled.His mother is Goanese, a culture once
colonized by Portugal and now
associated with a non-Hindu, minority
Christian identity much like Anglo-
Indians. Agastya's name is Sanskrit,
based on a forest-dwelling sage in the
Hindu epics Ramayana and
Mahabharata. However his friends
change his name to August because
they discover his secret wish that he
were an "Anglo-Indian, that he had
Keith or Alan for a name, that he
spoke English with their accent. From
that day his friends had more new
names for him, he became the schools
last Englishman, or just hey English
(his friends meant hey Anglo but
didn't dare) and sometimes even
Hello Mother Tongue"(2). As amother tongue connotes the essentialist
desire to claim a language as belonging
to one's ethnic identity, so also with
Agastya's Sanskrit name. Such a
desire is parodied and displaced by
August's desire for Anglo-Indian
identity.
24. As with English, the conflict over Urduor Hindi is also rooted in a desire for
authenticity. In the novel In Custody,
the condition of the Urdu department
is even worse than that of the Hindi
department. It is small and precarious,
"there on sufferance merely" (103). It
is linked with "Muslim ideas" and
"Muslim toadies" (145). Nur, the
Muslim Urdu poet, mocks Deven, the
Hindu Hindi lecturer, in a fit of rage at
the condition of Urdu in post-
independence India.
28/11/2010 Language in India
languageinindia.com//fixinglanguage1 19/49
-
8/7/2019 Language in India3
20/49
What is the matter?
Forgotten your Urdu?
Forgotten my verse?
Perhaps it is better if you
go back to your college
and teach your students
the . . . safe, simple Hindi
language, safecomfortable ideas of cow
worship and caste and
worship of Krishna. . . .
Why such treatment for
Urdu, my friends?
Because Urdu is
supposed to have died, in
1947. . . . But Hindi --
oh Hindi is a field ofgreens, all flourishing. . . .
(56)
Hindi is obviously associated with the
Hindu god Krishna, also the mythical
hero of the epic Mahabharata, as
well as with the Hindu tradition of
vegetarianism associated with cow-
worship and eschewing beef-eating.
These associations are further tied upwith Sanskrit, the classical language of
Aryans, also constructed as the
repository of Indian culture. Desai's
novel reveals how Urdu is nostalgically
associated with the courts of nawabs
during Muslim rule of the Middle Ages
in India.
25. Such fictional revelations have theircounterpart in the 19th- and 20th-
century Hindu nationalist
historiography, which frequently
narrativized the Middle Ages as the
time of foreign invasions and
categorized Muslims as foreigners.
According to Partha Chatterjee, Indian
nationalists in the late 19th and early
20th centuries needed "to claim for the
Indian nation the historical agency for
completing the project of modernity.
To make that claim, ancient India had
to become the classical source of
28/11/2010 Language in India
languageinindia.com//fixinglanguage1 20/49
-
8/7/2019 Language in India3
21/49
Indian modernity, while the Muslim
period would become the night of
medieval darkness" (The Nation and
its Fragments 102). The politics of
religious identities create linguistic
identities; Urdu is Arabized to be
primarily associated with Muslims even
though linguistic differences betweenHindi and Urdu are minute. [11] In the
novel, we see the impact of such
divisive politics in the
postindependence Urdu community;
most Urdu speakers are poor, living in
run-down neighborhoods, and easy
targets of violence. Nur, the Urdu
poet, dejectedly states, "The defeat of
the Mughals by the British threw anoose over its [Urdu's] head, and the
defeat of the British by the Hindi-
wallahs tightened it" (42). This
metaphor of death by hanging and the
extended conceit of detention and
sentence expresses Nur's frustration at
his marginalization in India. The Urdu
department in Deven's college is
poorly funded; his request for money
to tape Urdu poetry is met with
hostility by the administration. Murad,
the publisher of an Urdu journal,
complains of his inability to pay
printers' and distributors' bills and of
shrinking readership and subscriptions.
Deven has to teach Hindi to pay bills.
Clearly, Urdu suffers in the novel
because it is linked with an Islamic
culture associated with the MiddleAges, especially since Urdu is not as
old as Sanskrit.
26. The idea that what is older is more
authentic is based on a search for
origins, which, according to Benedict
Anderson, is a typical yet
contradictory quality of nationalism.
He states that most nations createimmemorial and somewhat arbitrary
pasts, which validate present
conditions of belonging and settled
relationships (Imagined Communities
28/11/2010 Language in India
languageinindia.com//fixinglanguage1 21/49
-
8/7/2019 Language in India3
22/49
14). In this sense, claiming the past
and searching for origins are modern
phenomena. Dating India's past back
to the mythological histories of Aryans
is to the advantage of Hindi speakers,
many of whom are upper-caste,
middle-class Hindus. Hindi, with its
roots in Sanskrit, is constructed as themost authentic language. Urdu,
connected to Muslim culture, is
constructed as less authentic and more
foreign. English, introduced only in the
last two centuries by the British is, in
comparison to Hindi or Urdu, the least
authentic and most foreign. Any search
for origins claiming and constructing
the past also makes distinctionsbetween the foreign and the
indigenous.[12] In the 19th century,
middle-class nationalists deliberately
homogenized internal differentiations
among Indians in order to organize
anticolonial resistance. Similarly, such
internal differences post independence
are deliberately essentialized to
enhance upper-caste, middle-class
Hindu power and alienate Muslim
group identity. Tensions between Urdu
and Hindi refract the contending
dialogic forms of discourse shaping
India-as-nation.
27. In Custody reveals these contending
dialogic forms of discourse in the
national bourgeoisie's deliberate
attempts to separate Urdu from Hindiand to authenticate the latter at the
expense of the former; these actions
expose their attempts to fix the ways in
which the two languages will interrelate
and be utilized by the national
community. Yet the fictional text also
reveals other ways in which these
languages relate and are used by their
communities of speakers. Muradassures Deven that Urdu has future
prospects with its international
audience in countries like Russia, Iran,
Iraq, Malaysia, and Sweden. This
28/11/2010 Language in India
languageinindia.com//fixinglanguage1 22/49
-
8/7/2019 Language in India3
23/49
audience creates a demand for Nur's
poetry, which is submitted for the
Nobel Prize in literature. We can see
how this future is already a part of the
present when lines of ethnic/religious
identity get crossed in the teaching,
reading, composing, and publishing
activities that take place both in Urduand Hindi. Deven is a Hindu lover of
Urdu poetry. Both he and Siddiqui
collaborate from the Hindi and Urdu
departments to record Nur's poetry.
Deven becomes the custodian of Nur's
unpublished work: "he had imagined he
was taking Nur's poetry into safe
custody, and not realized that if he was
to be the custodian of Nur's genius,then Nur would become his custodian
and place him in custody too. This
alliance could be considered an
unendurable -- or else a shining honor.
Both demanded an equal strength"
(203). At the end of the novel, Deven
and Nur share a reciprocal relationship
that shows Hindi and Urdu speakers
relate in multiple ways outside the
parameters established by nationalist
discourse. These relationships
challenge the boundaries set by the
government-sponsored Three
Language Formula, which, through the
discourse on authenticity, seeks to
standardize and subordinate plural
linguistic identities under upper-caste,
middle-class Hindu power.
28. Some of the commentators in the
eighties deliberately uncloak the
premises of such power when they
present a narrative of Hindi's and
Urdu's shared history.[13] They refer
to a time in Indian history when
differences between the two languages
were minimal, when these languages
were utilized equally by Hindus,Muslims, and other religious
communities, and when they were not
as politically charged as they have
been since the 1950s. These scholars
28/11/2010 Language in India
languageinindia.com//fixinglanguage1 23/49
-
8/7/2019 Language in India3
24/49
assert that these languages became
contested territories after partition,
representing specific communities
which were struggling to define their
positions within India. Urdu was
delinked from other Indian languages.
They feel that these distinctions
between languages are unhistorical andinexpressive of living speech. They
point out that Sanskrit is not the root
of every linguistic community in India
unless it rediscovers its mixed roots
with Urdu. These scholars contribute
to debates on authenticity by
problematizing relatively recent
constructions of Hindi as
authentic/Hindu/Indian and Urdu asinauthentic/Muslim/ foreign. They
reveal how the desire for essentialized
identities ignores the ambivalent nature
of language and how vocabulary is
built over time in response to cultural
needs and in relation to other
languages.[14] Both Hindi and Urdu
have evolved by molding themselves to
each other and to the culture; the
relations between the two languages
once again defy the sterile possibilities
laid out by the Three-Language
Formula.
29. Ultimately, all arguments favoring
authenticity, whether it is that of
English or Hindi, promote the idea of a
single national language or a unified
linguistic formula of translation that willtie the nation together. Whether
English functions as the de facto
language of power or Sanskritized
Hindi is chosen as the official language,
these languages work to legitimize
upper-caste, middle-class Hindu
power within India. It is this class that
has the most access to English and
also claims Sanskrit, the classicallanguage of Aryans, as its heritage. It is
also this class that inherited power
from the British. Distinctions between
what is indigenous/authentic and
28/11/2010 Language in India
languageinindia.com//fixinglanguage1 24/49
-
8/7/2019 Language in India3
25/49
foreign/inauthentic are constructed as
part of the "fix" into which language
debates have frozen and have
contributed to the fundamentalist
rhetoric of the BJP and the
secessionist violence of the 1980s.
Yet, if one reasons within this
framework, it is possible to find mostlanguages, including Sanskrit, foreign
and therefore inauthentic since they
were introduced to the subcontinent
through foreign invasions at some point
in Indian history. Only the Austric and
Dravidian languages, spoken by tribal
populations, date back to the earliest
indigenous inhabitants. These
languages, however, lack prestige,receive no funding, and are spoken by
only the most subaltern communities.
The language "fix" then attempts a
solution that makes a fixture of the
problem.
30. Since the 19th century, Indian leaders
have perceived a national language to
be a unifying mechanism against the
potentially divisive linguistic pluralismof India and a homogenizing tool
enhancing development where
heterogeneity signals
underdevelopment.[15] However, in
multilingual India, promoting any
language over others aggravates inter-
community tensions.[16] The
government formulated the Three-
Language Formula to control linguisticconflicts and pay lip service to
multilingualism. With this formula, it
attempted to standardize a linguistic
practice of translation by attempting to
control the way in which translation
was to occur between different
communities and fix the value of each
linking language. Easy translations
would consolidate and centralize Statepower. However, the novels and
news/journal articles under discussion
reveal the failures of such translations.
No one language is completely able to
28/11/2010 Language in India
languageinindia.com//fixinglanguage1 25/49
-
8/7/2019 Language in India3
26/49
express the other. Not one, but several
hierarchies have emerged in which
different languages compete for power
with, displace, and are displaced by
each other in differing regions.
Recalling the title of Desais novel,
while the language formula attempts to
safeguard the rights of each languageby acting as a custodian, the languages
take each other into custody by
holding each other hostage in an
attempt to safeguard their own power.
Power fluctuates between different
speakers and listeners; middle-class
protagonists often find themselves to
be relatively powerless. New alliances
are formed between newly visiblesubjects.
31. The novels reveal how all languages in
India are combative and create divisive
linguistic groups. Since 1947, Hindi
has been the official national language.
By the 1980s, many official documents
and broadcasts in the national media
are in Hindi. Hindi is used by different
classes in most North,West, andCentral Indian homes. The Hindi film
industry in Bombay enjoys a pan-
Indian audience; in fact, Desai's
English novel, In Custody, is filmed in
Hindi. In Desai's novel, Hindi is the
"vegetarian monster" displacing Urdu
from its pre-independent position as
official language (55). Urdu, despite
not being regionally concentrated,cannot function as a unifying official
language. Its demonization by Hindi
speakers divides Mirpur, the town in
which Deven lives, into warring
factions. Celebrations of Moharram (a
Muslim festival) and Holi (a Hindu
festival) often cause riots that are
solemnly reported in local newspapers
as evidence of the inability of bothcommunities to live within a national,
secular culture. With such factionalism,
Hindi cannot unify the nation. Neither
can it completely displace the currency
28/11/2010 Language in India
languageinindia.com//fixinglanguage1 26/49
-
8/7/2019 Language in India3
27/49
-
8/7/2019 Language in India3
28/49
manual labor -- values he wishes to
market for a privileged urban lifestyle.
In these instances, English divides its
speakers from the non-speakers into
disparate worlds of wealth and
poverty.
33. In the fiction, the underclass may bebrutalized by its inability to access the
power available through English, but it
also becomes visible in the gaps
established by the inability of the
English language to translate its
experiences. In fact, no language can
adequately translate meanings from
another. In the miscommunication that
follows, power fluctuates between
established groups of speakers. The
adivasis of Jompanna (English
August), Seora, Pirtha, and Kuruda
(Imaginary Maps) can speak mostly
only in their own dialect. When
communicating, these residents
pressure visitors and administrative
personnel to learn the local language.
Srivastava, a high-ranking official in
Madna, tells Agastya, a BlockDevelopment Officer in Jompanna,
"Yes, you'll face the problem of
language in Madna. They [the local
inhabitants] can't even speak Hindi
properly. . . . You see, in North India
and Bengal and other places, everyone
can follow Hindi. . . . And now
everything from the State government
comes in the regional language" (15-16). But Agastya is an urban, upper-
class Indian who can speak English
and Bengali fluently and Hindi haltingly;
he needs interpreters to help him
understand the adivasis. In these acts
of translation, no one is precisely able
to understand the other; urban,
middle-class power gets decentered
and hitherto marginalized subjectsbecome visible. For example, Puran, a
journalist who travels to Pirtha, is
stunned by the fact that adivasis have
no word in the Ho language for
28/11/2010 Language in India
languageinindia.com//fixinglanguage1 28/49
-
8/7/2019 Language in India3
29/49
exploitation because nothing within
their societies remotely resembles the
indignities they suffer from mainstream
culture. This lack represents meanings
that cannot be recovered; Puran is
confronted by the dilemma of the
untranslatable. At best his report
reveals the residues of translation, theexcess that cannot be communicated in
English, Hindi, or Bengali. In
Imaginary Maps, Mahasweta Devi
debunks the patronizing arrogance of
officials towards local dialects by
deliberately interspersing the latter with
formal Bengali in the style of a political
harangue. Educated Bengali is spoken
by middle-class urban dwellers whoare in league with the seats of power in
central government. Devi's technique
not only reveals how formal Bengali
oppresses local dialects but also
indicates local resistance to such
power. Devi's readers are also middle-
class intellectuals and artists who she
hopes will transcend class interests to
bond with the oppressed. It is obvious
that neither Hindi nor English can
successfully displace the currency of a
regional language in a specific region.
34. As these novels show, languages are
divisive not only because they are
combative but also because they are
internally fragmented. In English
August, Srivastav -- a civil servant
educated in Hindi who is part of anexpanding middle class -- desires to
use English to administer the country,
broker power, and share the class
privileges enjoyed by Agastya: "the
English we speak is not the English we
read in English books. . . . Our English
should be just a vehicle of
communication . . . how we speak
should not matter as long as we get theidea across" (59). Srivastav desires
that the administrative language be
different from the literary and
journalistic language with which
28/11/2010 Language in India
languageinindia.com//fixinglanguage1 29/49
-
8/7/2019 Language in India3
30/49
Agastya has fluency. Srivastava wants
this language to be absolutely
transparent in order to facilitate
interregional translations of culture,
information, and resources. However
complete transparency is impossible
because English is fractured from
within; not everyone speaks the sameEnglish. His English is different from
and has less market value than
Agastya's because Srivastav speaks
with a heavier vernacular accent. So
diction, accent, and fluency determine
class privileges. Fragmentation
happens within every language,
creating warring groups who cannot
communicate. Hindi, the other officiallanguage, also divides the country.
Agastya's Hindi in English Augustis
less fluent than that of his fellow Hindi-
speaking officers. Also, the adivasis
speak a broken Hindi quite different
from Agastya's because it is inflected
by the syntactical structure of the Ho
language. These differences cause a
clash of cultures resulting in the
psychological violence of governmental
authority, Agastya's alienation, and his
consequent withdrawal from his work
environment.
35. The combative relations between
languages are also evident in the
discord between journalists in the
1980s. Several news and journal
reports assert that English functions asthe de facto national language because
it affects law courts, communications,
government documents, and higher
education.[17] These reports note that
English is widespread and deeply
entrenched: its words and phrases
exist independently in most Indian
languages; English-educated Indians
form a powerful national middle classwith international influence; and "The
trend . . . of sending one's child to an
English medium school has become a
veritable stampede" (Masica 9). In
28/11/2010 Language in India
languageinindia.com//fixinglanguage1 30/49
-
8/7/2019 Language in India3
31/49
short, they believe, it is difficult to live
without the mediation of English. But it
is this very entrenchment that makes
other journalists assert that English
does not unify the country as the lingua
franca but divides it into the privileged
and underprivileged: "the continued
ascendancy of English divides thenation into elites, who possess the
authority to make laws, and those who
are subjects of these laws" (Handa
13).[18] This faction claims that
English is dominant in India only
because it is the property of the elite;
through advertisements, the English
media present an urban lifestyle
inaccessible to most of the country.English-language newspapers are
relied upon to bring international news
their readers, who are treated
differently than Hindi language readers.
36. Journalists who espouse the cause of
Hindi bemoan its lack of funding and
shrinking publications as well as anti-
Hindi agitation by non-Hindi
speakers.[19] They declare that mostnewspaper owners' attitude to Hindi is
non-serious, unlike their attitude to
English journalism:
A majority of the Hindi
dailies in the Capital are
run by the business
houses whose first
commitment lieselsewhere and not to the
publication of
newspapers. . . . Hindi,
for them, is merely an
obligation, a burden, and
is to be discharged rather
unwillingly or indifferently
depending on the mood
of the ruling party.
Despite wider circulation
and better financial
performance, the same
management would deny
28/11/2010 Language in India
languageinindia.com//fixinglanguage1 31/49
-
8/7/2019 Language in India3
32/49
the facilities,
remuneration, pages, and
manpower to Hindi
journals, which would
place them at par with
the English publication
from the same house.
(Yadav 41)
As a result of these institutional
problems, they suggest, Hindi
journalism suffers from a diffused
readership, an absence of a cultural
pivot, indifferent political leadership,
and poor editing skills. Most pro-Hindi
agitators themselves lapse into English,
strengthening its persistent hegemony.
These journalists express anxiety and
nostalgia because, as Hindi-speakers,
they experience themselves as second-
class citizens. They write in English out
of necessity in order to reach a
powerful middle-class audience.
However, they are also members of
the English-speaking middle class; their
critique of the hegemony of English
becomes ironic because it is facilitatedthrough the medium of English. These
journalists all belong to the middle
class, write in English, and benefit from
the privileges of an English education.
They do not argue for extending the
privileges of English among the lower
classes nor are they able to suggest
practical viable alternatives to the
hegemony of English.
37. However, English is not the only
language that is hegemonic. Several
articles in Volume 332 ofSeminar,
Link (Khullar 37-38), Advance
(Khullar 20-27), and Economic and
Political Weekly (1410)[20]
elaborate on how Urdu has suffered
with the promotion of Hindi as the
national language: decreased funding;
disappearing schools; declining number
of teachers; poor printing facilities;
curricula that drop Urdu, the
28/11/2010 Language in India
languageinindia.com//fixinglanguage1 32/49
-
8/7/2019 Language in India3
33/49
governments decision in 1958 to
declare Urdu a dialect of Hindi; its
linkage with the Muslim community,
even though all Muslims do not speak
Urdu, and with predominantly poor,
illiterate or semi-literate speakers, who
cannot promote the language. They
point out how the pro-Hindi lobbywithin the government prevents the
promotion of Urdu.[21] From their
underlying assumptions, it is apparent
that Urdus association with Islam and
the demonization of Indian Muslims
complicates Urdu-Hindi relations. The
government's failure to promote Urdu
has been quoted, in the 1980s, as an
instance of its pro-Hindu sentiments byIslamic parties in Kashmir demanding
secession from India. Such demands
are paralleled by a corresponding
Hindu fundamentalism, demonizing
Indian Muslims, with the rise of the
Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).
38. The tension between Indian languages
can be clarified in terms of Bakhtin's
idea of the centripetal and centrifugalforces within language (The Dialogic
Imagination 259-272).[22]
Centripetal forces are the historical
processes of centralization and
unification, resulting in a unitary
language, while the centrifugal,
heteroglossic forces of decentralization
stratify language into dialects and
socio-ideological groups in everyepoch, community, or nation. The
desire within the national leadership for
a unifying national language or at least
a uniform method of translation, such
as the Three Language Formula, can
be seen as a product of centripetal
forces. But a unitary language does not
exist within India; Hindi, the official
language, would claim such privileges ifit were not displaced by English. Both
Hindi and English are further displaced
by and displace regional languages in a
phenomenon that Bakhtin terms
28/11/2010 Language in India
languageinindia.com//fixinglanguage1 33/49
-
8/7/2019 Language in India3
34/49
heteroglossia. These heteroglossic or
centrifugal forces of decentralization
not only create hierarchies between
languages but stratify these from
within, causing each language to
fragment. In these mutual acts of
displacement and stratification,
different socio-ideological groups enterinto combative relations to acquire and
safeguard power. These combative
interactions merely highlight the
contradiction inherent in desiring a
unifying language or language formula.
39. Decolonization not only involves the
creation of imagined communities
through the workings of print
capitalism, as Benedict Anderson has
suggested, but also through the
appropriation of a common language
to lend passion and purpose to the
community so imagined. The dissent
over which language is to be so
selected points to the existence of
multiple imagined communities, each of
which engage in combative interactions
with one another in an attempt to stakea claim on the nation. The different
class factions are engaged in a
symbolic struggle, one aimed at
imposing the definition of the social
world that is best suited to their
interests. Symbols, according to Pierre
Bourdieu, are instruments of
knowledge that make possible a
consensus on the meaning of the socialworld, which contributes to the
reproduction of the social order (166).
Language belongs to the symbolic
field; the choice of a national language
becomes a crucial issue when the
dominant middle class, whose power
rests on economic capital, aims to
impose the legitimacy of its dominance
through the continued currency ofEnglish in India. The statutory choice
of Hindi further complicates the
problem because it ostensibly
empowers the Hindi-speaking North
28/11/2010 Language in India
languageinindia.com//fixinglanguage1 34/49
-
8/7/2019 Language in India3
35/49
and Central Indian states that then
dominate the legislative process. A
large part of the middle class comes
from these regions. The further
subordination of Urdu, regional, and
tribal languages creates a hierarchy,
which becomes a site for the struggle
for dominance and control ofresources and power in India. The
novels and the news reports under
discussion reveal how the language
"fix" is a part of the problem causing
tensions between communities in the
eighties. Combative interactions
between linguistic communities assist
the democratic process by unsettling
the sites of middle-class power,ultimately creating more space for
minority and marginalized discourses
to emerge.
Notes
1. Chatterjee calls this class the petit
bourgeoisie, stretching from clerks to
lawyers, doctors, and landowners.
Back
2. The status ofImaginary Maps as a
work of translation is relevant in light
of this dialogic interaction between
languages. Originally written in Bengali,
it was translated into English by Spivak
and read worldwide. The deliberate
experiments Spivak makes withEnglish in representing the Bengali
dialect are creative and valid in their
own terms, much like Indianized
English. The translated text takes on its
own identity independent of the
Bengali original. Back
3. This article, written as it is by an
English-educated member of this class,
also falls under the same constellation
of ideological features but seeks to
investigate the premises of middle-
class power. Back
28/11/2010 Language in India
languageinindia.com//fixinglanguage1 35/49
-
8/7/2019 Language in India3
36/49
4. These journalists assumptions are
supported by the prevailing
international scholarly opinion. For
example, Ayo Bamgbose, the African
theorist, states that an increased flow
of information in developing nations in
Asia and Africa makes expert
knowledge available where needed
and provides a forum for leadership
and decision making (Language and
the Nation 39). Bamgbose surveys
the relationship between language and
national development in several
multilingual African countries to show
how language facilitates literacy and
communication, which impacts directly
on the socio-economic development ofa nation. Back
5. Sharada Venkataraman (Hindu 24),
Shyam Ratna Gupta (Hindustan
Times 9), Colin Masica (CIEFL
Bulletin 13), Lachman M.
Khubchandani (International Social
Science Journal 169), K.K. Mishra
(Link23-24), "Not by DemandAlone" (8). Back
6. This desire for an authentic language
that will encapsulate the national
identity is shared by the leadership of
many nations in the late 19th and 20th
centuries. According to Joshua
Fishman, the "essence of nationality is
reflected in the continuous use of
language over a period of time," whichhe terms the "vernacular" (45). The
vernacular is used by the "protoelites"
of a nation as an "authenticating tool
for modernization, political
consolidation, and mass consensus at
social change" (42-43). Fishman
writes that in order to satisfy demands
for authenticity, the national leadership
of a developing nation will often selecta particular language, as the
vernacular, for official use. This
becomes "an intrinsic part of the birth
of national consciousness among the
28/11/2010 Language in India
languageinindia.com//fixinglanguage1 36/49
-
8/7/2019 Language in India3
37/49
populace" (57). Back
7. See Bhabha's article "Postcolonial
Authority and Postmodern Guilt"
(Location of Culture 56-68). Back
8. Of particular relevance to my argument
is Homi Bhabha's article "Of Mimicry
and Man: The Ambivalence of
Colonial Discourse." Bhabha argues
that colonial discourse seeks to stamp
its own image on the colonized, to
create a reformed, recognizable Other.
This image is almost but not quite the
same as the colonizing power; the
colonized other mimics the colonizing
self with a difference within the
sameness. This mimicry becomes a
mockery of the colonizer, exposing the
double standards inherent in colonial
rule. The effect of this mimicry is
disturbing for in "normalizing" the
colonial subject, colonial authority
alienates its own language of liberty
and produces another knowledge of its
norms. The discourse of post
Enlightenment English colonialismtherefore cannot be anything other than
a mimicry of itself. Dr. Upadhyay, the
colonized other, educated in the
"civilizing" culture of his colonial
masters, can only hanker for a
language that can unproblematically
reflect its own authenticity. He is
unaware that he himself becomes a site
for the splitting of colonial discourse;his nostalgia becomes a sign of his split
desire. Back
9. This is an extract from his article,
"Growth of Inglish in India" published
in Hindu on December 3, 1985. He
formulates the four stages through
which English became "Inglish," that is,
increasingly popular and Indianized.
The first is the transportation phase
(1600-1800) covering the power
struggle between British and Indian
rulers for control over land,
28/11/2010 Language in India
languageinindia.com//fixinglanguage1 37/49
-
8/7/2019 Language in India3
38/49
commerce, and communications.
English was introduced for training civil
servants to spread British culture.
During this period, only the upper class
had access to it. However, domestic
servants working in upper class
households picked up some
rudimentary terms. The second stage isbetween 1850 to 1900, when English
was Indianized. During this time, all
Indian universities used English as a
medium of instruction. Poets, writers,
and activists like Tagore and Gandhi
used English with an Indian flavor.
English was institutionalized during the
third phase (1900-1950) when it was
frequently used by the Swadeshimovement to communicate with the
rest of the country, British officials, and
other parts of the world. The identity
stage (1950 and after) was the final
stage in the appropriation of English in
India when, according to
Krishnamurthy, the need for building a
modern nation has led to the use of
Indian words, expressions, accents,
tones, and cultural values in the English
spoken by Indians. This brand of
"Inglish" has flourished with the growth
of newspapers and magazines in India
(19). Back
10. Sethna is the editor ofMother India, a
journal published on a monthly basis
from 1960 onwards in Bombay and
funded by the Sri Aurobindo AshramTrust. The title of this journal is
significant because it is based on an
Indian mystic, Sri Aurobindo's vision
of India as a mother. This vision also
ties in with the nationalist construction
of India as the motherland demanding
devotion, loyalty, and self sacrifice of
its citizens/children. This idea of the
mother is also essentialist in naturewhere India is often seen as an
embodiment of the mystical east as
opposed to the material west,
assumptions that inform Sethnas
28/11/2010 Language in India
languageinindia.com//fixinglanguage1 38/49
-
8/7/2019 Language in India3
39/49
orientalist ideas of English in India.
Back
11. The theorist Itamar Even-Zohar
asserts that the linguistic diversity
between the two languages has been
invented by concerned communities of
speakers since independence in orderto effect this difference (Nationalism
and Modernity: A Mediterranean
Perspective 130-131). Even-Zohar
argues that language conflict occurs
only when there is an ideological
conflict among different groups, such
as Hindus and Muslims, within a
nation. Then everything linguistic
becomes a burning issue for the
conflicting parties, including the most
minute details of language structure
that would otherwise have interested
only a small group of specialists. In the
case of Hindi or Urdu, spelling,
pronunciation, grammatical
declinations, word order, and
vocabulary may all become semiotic
carriers of identity promoted or
rejected by different groups (127).Back
12. Chatterjee claims that even before
independence, the national imaginary
asserted its freedom from colonial
domination by distinguishing between
the outer/foreign and inner/indigenous
domains of the nation (The Nation
and its Fragments 6-11). Since1947, distinctions between the outside
and inside became internal
differentiations with certain kinds of
Indians (Hindu, majority, upper-caste)
on the inside and others (non-Hindu,
minority, lower-caste) on the outside.
However, Chatterjee is incorrect in
assuming that precolonial identity was
not as internally differentiated as
postcolonial identities. Back
13. "Kaif" (Research Bulletin Arts
Punjab University 114), Iqbal Khan
28/11/2010 Language in India
languageinindia.com//fixinglanguage1 39/49
-
8/7/2019 Language in India3
40/49
(Times of India 5-6), Mohammed
Peer (Guru Nanak Journal of
Sociology 138-149), K. K. Khullar
(Advance 20-27), and Amrit Rai (A
House Divided285-289). They agree
that both languages evolved around
1000 AD during the Prakrit-
Apabhransa stage with theestablishment of the first Muslim
dynasty in India. Spoken in the
bazaars of Delhi, these scholars
believe Hindi/Urdu was at first one
language which developed initially in
Golconda and Bijapore, in the Deccan
Plateau, before it came to North India.
This common language was variously
called Dakani, Gurjari, Khari Boli, andHindavi, and contained a mixture of
Sanskrit, Arabic, Persian, and Brij
Bhasha. It grew as a response to the
need for communication between
Persian conquerors and their Indian
subjects for 600 years, when both
Hindu and Muslim poets and
preachers wrote in this language. Rai,
Peer, Khan, and Khullar state that this
mixed language, now called
Hindustani, split into Urdu and Hindi
since the 17th and 18th centuries with
the breakup of the Mughal empire,
when Muslims and Hindus became
concerned about preserving their
separate identities. The British used
these divisions to maintain their power
by polarizing the Hindus and Muslims -
a polarization accentuated by thecommunal politics of Jinnah and the
Muslim League that split the Indian
subcontinent into India and Pakistan.
Back
14. I am using this word with particular
reference to Homi Bhabha's
introduction to Nation and Narration
where he focuses on this turbulent andambivalent nature of language and
connects it to a similar quality within
the nation(1-7). He believes that
nations are ambivalent in their
28/11/2010 Language in India
languageinindia.com//fixinglanguage1 40/49
-
8/7/2019 Language in India3
41/49
transitional histories and conceptual
indeterminacy. This ambivalence is
reflected in national boundaries which
determine those included and excluded
- a process producing unpredictable
forces of political antagonism. Bhabha
asserts that like national discourse,
language is also ambivalent. Thisquality in language enables us to
understand how the nation when
narrated can turn boundaries into in-
between spaces through which the
meanings of cultural and political
authority are negotiated; the "other" is
therefore never outside the nation but
emerges forcefully within indigenous
cultural discourse. Bhabha's insightsare valuable for understanding the
language problem in India where much
of the mutual demonizing of Urdu,
Hindi, and English speakers emerges
from this in-between space within the
nation in which all ambiguously
experience themselves as self and
other. Back
15. This choice seems to endorse PierreBourdieus argument that these needs
for a unifying language of state "create
specific conditions of language use,"
generating a "conflict-ridden historical
process" from which a "particular set
of linguistic practices emerges as
dominant" (Language and Symbolic
Power5). However, not all of
Bourdieu's ideas apply to India. If, ashe says, the process of state formation
creates conditions for a "unified
linguistic market dominated by the
official language," this language would
be the most privileged (48). Back
16. Nehru was unable to retain Hindi as
the only official language as per the
Official Languages Act in 1963; he
had to amend it in 1967 to retain
English as the associate official
language. He also linguistically
reorganized states and discouraged
28/11/2010 Language in India
languageinindia.com//fixinglanguage1 41/49
-
8/7/2019 Language in India3
42/49
any demand for special languages
unless these had popular support.
Nehru's policies proved to be
unpopular. Language riots broke out in
Madras in 1950, and in Andhra
Pradesh, Kerala, Karnataka, and
Punjab through the 60s and 70s, which
partly fueled the rise of militantseparatist movements in the 1980s.The
Nagpur Conference of 1920 , the
Nehru Committee in 1923, the
Calcutta Congress in 1937, and the
Congress Party manifesto in 1945-46
provided the groundwork for Nehru's
policies. See Suman (Seminar on
National Integration and
Communal Harmony 165-167).Back
17. Shyam Ratna Gupta (Hindustan
Times 9), Sharada Venkataraman
(Hindu 24), Colin Masica (CIEFL
Bulletin 7-14) and Raja (Mother
India 374-76). While Gupta, Raja,
and Venkataraman openly espouse
English as an extension of their class
privileges, Masica adopts the stance ofa disinterested scholar without an
agenda. Back
18. Anjuli Gupta (Hindustan Times 9)
and R.L. Handa (Missing Links in the
Link Language 13). They seem to
take recourse to a nationalist discourse
that sets itself up against foreign
influences, which they construct asantinational and undemocratic. Back
19. Rajendra Yadav (Link40-42), M.K.
Tikku (Hindustan Times 9), and
K.K. Mishra (Link23-24). Back
20. This volume ofSeminar, a monthly
magazine, published several articles by
A. Naseer Khan (30-34), Khaliq
Anjum (35-36), Raj Bahadur Gaur (),Akhilesh Mithal (), Mohammed Hasan
(14-16), Hasan Abdullah (17-19),
Gopi Chand Narang (22-25), and I.K.
28/11/2010 Language in India
languageinindia.com//fixinglanguage1 42/49
-
8/7/2019 Language in India3
43/49
Gujral(26-29). Back
21. These journalists list the number of
activities undertaken by the
government to ostensibly promote
Urdu: creation of Urdu professorships,
awarding of prizes to Urdu writers, its
inclusion as an Indian language underSchedule VIII of the Constitution, the
holding of two All India Conferences,
and the conducting of several signature
campaigns and official commissions. In
their opinion, despite these activities,
the government discourages large scale
institutionalization of Urdu at primary
and secondary school levels. Attempts
to promote Urdu as a second official
language in the 1970s b
top related