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Will English kill off India’s languages | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Cultural Experiences in Foreign Languages |  | |
| JimC Senior Member United Kingdom tinyurl.com/aberdeen Joined 5547 days ago 199 posts - 317 votes  Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish | Message 1 of 6 29 November 2011 at 6:01pm | IP Logged | ||
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-
15635553 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| nway Senior Member United States youtube.com/user/Vic Joined 5415 days ago 574 posts - 1707 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish, Mandarin, Japanese, Korean | Message 2 of 6 08 December 2011 at 8:22am | IP Logged | ||
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India's major languages are extremely well-positioned in a way most non-major languages in the world aren't. Indian languages consistently top the rankings of the world's most spoken languages, so to think a language like Telugu or Marathi, each with 80 million speakers; or Gujarati, with 65 million speakers; or even Kannada, with "only" 50 million speakers, would just "disappear" within a generation or a century is certainly silly. Of course, there are hundreds of minor Indian languages that will indeed become extinct within the next generation's lifetime, but this will not be because of English, but rather due to the same dynamics that are jeopardizing all minor languages, be they Hakka or Sundanese.
Besides, the notion that India as a whole is fairly proficient in English is an outright myth: 
If the current proficiency of English in India will kill off India's languages, then so too, to an even greater extent, will the current proficiency of English in France kill off French. 14 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| lichtrausch Triglot Senior Member United States Joined 5960 days ago 525 posts - 1072 votes Speaks: English*, German, Japanese Studies: Korean, Mandarin | Message 3 of 6 08 December 2011 at 4:21pm | IP Logged | ||
While I agree that the scheduled Indian languages aren't going anywhere, they are under more pressure than French in France, because English is the prestige language in India, but not in France. A better comparison might be between the effects of English in India and the effects of French in Africa. 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| napoleon Tetraglot Senior Member India Joined 5016 days ago 543 posts - 874 votes Speaks: Bengali*, English, Hindi, Urdu Studies: French, Arabic (Written) | Message 4 of 6 08 December 2011 at 5:23pm | IP Logged | ||
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Will English kill off India's languages?
An article with a title like that especially in the BBC reeks of sensationalism, does it not? :-) It seems ironic that while the British are so interested in protecting their own dialects; they should suggest that India should not worry if English kills her languages. Most of India's languages have a very rich and diverse literary legacy. Such hope is just wishful thinking by the well-intentioned but obviously misguided author. Very few Indians are native speakers of English. According to Wikipedia, the number is 178,598 i.e., 0.021% of the entire Indian population. Speaking from personal experience: Indians who are really proficient in International English are just a tiny fraction of the majority. Most speak a pidgin: a blend of their native language and English. Indian English, today, is in a league of its own. It has its own unique words, its own idioms and most importantly, a large target audience of its own. Interestingly, Indian English is not as homogenous as it would seem. It is the amalgamation of are various mutually-intelligible regional dialects like Hindlish, Benlish, Tamlish, etc. The obfuscated legalese that passes as "Business English" in India is chock full of archaisms, remnants of its colonial legacy. If memory serves me right, Jyothi Sanyal (deceased), an eminent journalist, in his time, wrote a book on the varieties and quirks of Indian English. Nosw, not every student of English in India has access to good teachers. It is like a vicious cycle where teachers teach incorrectly and then the students graduate and become teachers. The cycle continues... To come back to the relevant topic, I honestly do not think that English will succeed in causing the death of any major Indian language although it may very well bleed them a little. ;-) Napoleon UPDATE: http://jyotisanyal.blogspot.com/ Just go through the late Jyoti Sanyal's blog. You will get a much better overview of the ground realities of English education in India. Edited by napoleon on 08 December 2011 at 5:51pm 5 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Cavesa Triglot Senior Member Czech Republic Joined 5009 days ago 3277 posts - 6779 votes Speaks: Czech*, FrenchC2, EnglishC1 Studies: Spanish, German, Italian | Message 5 of 6 09 December 2011 at 1:24am | IP Logged | ||
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I'd say that India is at quite the same "English" pressure as always since collonisation. The only difference is that the "prestige" is connected to business instead of foreign ruler now. The languages haven't died out till now, than they'll most probably stay for quite long. And as some said, the "smaller" languages still have around 50 millions of speakers. Thats like several small european countries, each with their own language, together. (If I count well, it is like speakers of Czech+Slovak+Swedish+Norwegian+Danish+Dutch)
3 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Camundonguinho Triglot Senior Member Brazil Joined 4749 days ago 273 posts - 500 votes Speaks: Portuguese*, English, Spanish Studies: Swedish | Message 6 of 6 01 January 2012 at 1:47pm | IP Logged | ||
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Indians don't like watching Indian movies in English.
They like to watch them in Indian languages, be it in Hindi, Tamil, Malayalam, Telugu, Bengali, Kannada... English in India is like Latin in medieval Europe, mainly. the language of universities and government. Nevertheless, speakers of Konkani (an Indian languages) are the ones who get the best results on the TOEFL test: ''According to the ETS data, a Konkani student's average grade was 622 during the 1993-95 TOEFL exam while Maltese and Dutch students' average was 610 and 608 respectively.'' http://books.google.hr/books?id=p5iK3CmIW6EC&pg=PA102&lpg=PA 102&dq=toefl+konkani&source=bl&ots=Vv8iyLm-vp&sig=n5guhmsX5m BGR-U2-pggQLrue7o&hl=es&sa=X&ei=YlYAT6CoDczHtAbmp8mbCQ&redir _esc=y#v=onepage&q=toefl%20konkani&f=false Average Indian is not proficient in English, because an average Indian is poor and uneducated. (70% of population) But, most middle class Indians (25% of population) and all upper class Indians (5%) are proficient in English. If you want to become a policeman in India, you have to know how to speak English. In France or Brazil, most policeman can't speak English, nor is the knowledge of this language a requirement for the job. In India, it's rare to find a university student who can't speak English, unlike in France or Brazil. Sonia Ghandi, one of the most influential politicians in today's India speaks English very well (and Hindi not too well). You can't find examples like this one in France or Brazil. She speaks English better than Arnold Schwarzenegger. ;) An example of Indian English: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4HcS49qxbdw I prefer Indian English to non-native European English, it sounds exotic, and they DO have a rich vocabulary, most Europeans limit themselves to 1000 basic words and phrases, as if they were kindergarten children. ;) Edited by Camundonguinho on 01 January 2012 at 2:08pm 3 persons have voted this message useful |
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