Will English kill off India's languages?

[Chinese-Dragon]

Those Chinese, who are protesting against the Mandarin, are only few local ultra conservative regionists.

True. It is all Chinese anyway.

If you ask a Mandarin or Cantonese speaker what language they are speaking, the answer is the same. They will both say, "I am speaking Chinese."

It makes sense for everyone in a nation to be able to communicate with each other in the same dialect.

 

[ChineseTiger1986]

On the other hand, will Indians kill English(specifically Queen's). Most britons will agree

Well, a lot of British women love to marry with the rich Hindu guys, this is definitely true.

 

[Developereo]

English is the de-facto official language of India's Central Government?

Seriously?

The reason is that English is the only language acceptable to all Indians.

People in South India will not speak Hindi, even though they may have learnt it in school. I don't expect Indians on this forum will admit it, but you just need to ask South Indians in real life.

They will tell you.

Every single one.

 

[russellpeters]

Our pride in our civilization is great enough , it will not be disturbed by speaking one language or another. And remember, Latin and Greek are sisters of Sanskrit, English therefore becomes a member of our larger heritage ?

Also we have soo many distinct languages here, it helps to have a nuetral language.

I for my part know Kashmiri(as my mother tongue), Hindi, English, Urdu(remember Kashmir...), Sanskrit. I have a working understanding of Latin and Japanese, though I am not fluent in either.
Indians also end up knowing a lot of Persian and Arabic words, due to the influence in Hindi, Urdu, even regional languages.

I motioned the stall owner in Kahira (Cairo) to make my coffee as 'mazboot'. He smiled back.Also most people dont know that even Persian is a relative of sanskrit.All mixed up, like pav bhaji aint it ?

 

[kingkobra]

Well, since Germans are ethnically very close related to Dutch and English, so it is good for them to intermarry with each other in US.

Same for Northern Chinese and Southern Chinese, it is good for us to intermarry with each other, so we could all speak Mandarin at the end.

ya one thinks it is good and yet there are protests like these in china...

 

[ChineseTiger1986]

True. It is all Chinese anyway.

If you ask a Mandarin or Cantonese speaker what language they are speaking, the answer is the same. They will both say, "I am speaking Chinese."

It makes sense for everyone in a nation to be able to communicate with each other in the same dialect.

Something it is good to follow the conformity.

Even i love my own dialect Shanghainese, but it cannot represent as the common language that is also used for writing.

There is definitely some writing in Shanghainese, but even it is quite hard for a native Shanghainese speaker like me to read through it.

 

[Inqhilab]

Bakian da pata ni PUNJABI kite ni jandi

 

[kingkobra]

The reason is that English is the only language acceptable to all Indians.

People in South India will not speak Hindi, even though they may have learnt it in school. I don't expect Indians on this forum will admit it, but you just need to ask South Indians in real life.

They will tell you.

Every single one.

its not a secret...and i don't care if someone speaks hindi or not.

 

[Chinese-Dragon]

The reason is that English is the only language acceptable to all Indians.

People in South India will not speak Hindi, even though they may have learnt it in school. I don't expect Indians on this forum will admit it, but you just need to ask South Indians in real life.

They will tell you.

Every single one.

Yeah I saw that on here actually. Some member from Delhi was going on about how Hindi was THE national language... and all the South Indians got really pissed off at him.

I guess that is why they need English as the lingua franca of India.

 

[Bang Galore]

That's right, South China especially has a lot of different dialects. Here in Hong Kong we speak mainly Cantonese.

Mandarin (Standard Chinese) is the "lingua franca" that allows everyone in China to communicate with each other, regardless of regional dialect.

We are not talking dialects, we are speaking about completely different languages. There are probably a 1000 dialects spoken across India. The languages(not dialects) spoken are so completely different, especially in S.India that a speaker of one may simply not understand a sentence of the other using his own language as the base. He/she will need to learn the other languages separately. The languages spoken also belong to two completely different groups unlike in most other countries. Any comparisons with dialects is simply silly.

 

[ChineseTiger1986]

Our pride in our civilization is great enough , it will not be disturbed by speaking one language or another. And remember, Latin and Greek are sisters of Sanskrit, English therefore becomes a member of our larger heritage ?

I think the Iranian Avestan is the sister of the Vedic Sanskrit, and the Balto-Slavic is the cousin.

The Latin and the Greek are too western and too distantly related to the Sanskrit.

 

[Chinese-Dragon]

We are not talking dialects, we are speaking about completely different languages. There are probably a 1000 dialects spoken across India. The languages(not dialects) spoken are so completely different, especially in S.India that a speaker of one may simply not understand a sentence of the other using his own language as the base. He/she will need to learn the other languages separately. The languages spoken also belong to two completely different groups unlike in most other countries. Any comparisons with dialects is simply silly.

You misunderstand.

Cantonese and Mandarin are mutually unintelligible.

We just refer to them as dialects, that's how we say it. For reasons of unity, we like to say we are speaking dialects of the same language.

But according to the English definition, they are different languages, because they are mutually unintelligible.

 

[Loyus]

The reason is that English is the only language acceptable to all Indians.

People in South India will not speak Hindi, even though they may have learnt it in school. I don't expect Indians on this forum will admit it, but you just need to ask South Indians in real life.

They will tell you.

Every single one.

That is incorrect..

in the 50s and 60s the indian government tried to impose Hindi as the national language..

That was vehemently opposed especially in Tamil Nadu

As of today in south India.. karnataka, kerala and Andhra you can communicate in Hindi

In Tamil Nadu due to economic migration and globalisation (I am talking about a common national market and not the inetrantional one) Hindi is being spoken by a lot of people
I was surprised when I visited Chennai in August..The scene was different in 2004

My mother tongue is not Hindi so please don;t think of me as biased

India does not have a national language but it has 16-17 official languages

And about English

english these days is not considered foreign language any more..
People are competitive these days and not emotionally attached to discard English

english is also the major medium of language in a state of India..
Nagaland

Once again..If you try to impose anything you will be opposed

Accepatnce should come from woithin.. not forced.. especially in a diverse country called India

 

[Developereo]

its not a secret...and i don't care if someone speaks hindi or not.

I know. I was explaining why English is needed even though Hindi is the 'national' language. Many (most?) Indians simply do not accept Hindi as their language.

 

[metro]

ooh.. little late to the thread.. just got relieved from the ban..
In my opinion , its not that English would kill off Indian languages, its just that, our people should have pride in our own languages instead of taking English as a show off of modern-ness and fad.

English is just a language, and should be taken as that only.
Altough i would personally like to see less influence of english in our lives.

Just to give a eg. a few weeks, I saw this poster on a delhi steet-- Stick No Bills--- as if the person who is gonna stick bill could even understand that american english.