Are we an English obsessed nation?

Last updated on: April 9, 2010 at 3:13 pm by Jennifer Clark

Are we an English obsessed nation? 2010-04-09T15:13:58-05:00 Jennifer Clark

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

The two largest English speaking countries in the world are India (350 million) and United States (300 million). In the next decade more than half of the English speaking population on Earth will be Indians. We will determine how the language will be spoken. Feels good, but I have a question – will Mamata Banerjee’s spoken words qualify as English too? She could be speaking in Hindi, Bangla or English – to me it comes across as a strange, uniform version of Esperanto.

A recent survey has officially established the Queen’s language as India’s lingua franca. That comes as no surprise. We as a nation still suffer from a massive colonial hangover. In school we are essentially taught British. Mushrooming BPO s promote the Yankee version. Our children end up speaking a bastardized version. Texting has made it worse. Address is now addy, afternoon afty, vacation vacays…kids are playing around with the language, which may not be such a bad thing. Why waste time on silly things such as spellings and sentences? It’s so not cool.

The non-NextGen Indians on the other hand love their English, more than even the English. Nowhere in the world are people so particular about diction and grammar. Maybe it represents much more than just being particular. How one holds forth in English often reflects schooling, social background. Pepper your conversation with a few tricky words and you are qualified to fit into certain elitist circles. A rather superficial way of slotting people, yet most of us succumb to it.

The world over, English spoken with a foreign accent is considered exotic. Did any one of us snigger at Penelope’s Oscar acceptance speech? But dare anyone in our country say yem yen square, we make that person the butt of our jokes for the rest of his unfortunate life. We are a lot more tolerant of incorrect Hindi.

We name our pets Sparkle, Goldy and Tipsy. Parmeet becomes Pinky, Sandeep becomes Sandy. Our children are more conversant in English rather than their mother tongue. Even my daughter prefers English even though the first language we taught her was Bangla. Why blame the kids, it is the parents who reinforce the belief. An NRI friend of mine had briefly migrated to Bangalore. At community get-togethers try as she might she could not get people to speak to her in Bangla. Who do you think we are – village bumpkins?

Agreed, in a diverse country such as ours it is this language that binds us together. We are heavyweights in the global IT space largely because of our ability to think and speak in English. And we have scored over China in acquisition of brands like Jaguar, Tetley and Corus probably because our felicity in a western language engenders western comfort.

It has certainly helped us stay connected globally, access and upload information globally, and share experiences globally. Millions of us mull over the philosophies of Ayn Rand, applaud the visual wizardry of Avatar, and sway to Linkin Park (for me it’s good old Eagles any day).

But if this language is the great unifying factor, the harbinger of opportunities, it is also a divisive factor. Lack of it translates into lack of opportunities. Small towns and cities where subjects are still taught in the vernacular are still grappling with this change. In metropolitan cities like Mumbai and Delhi our rich diverse vernacular is dying a slow death. I miss the mellifluous, full of “adaa”, Lucknawi Hindi which my Dad and uncles used to speak. I can’t remember the last time I heard someone speak in chaste Hindi. All I hear is a confused mishmash. “You won’t believe what I saw jee, I toh nearly fainted”.

Is our obsession with English making us lose our identity? Or are we evolving into a new progressive society? On the flip side, were we better off with Bombay and everything it represented, or are we better off now with Mumbai and everything it is being forced to represent? We live in strange times where, in rural India, innocent youngsters are being killed because they dared to fall in love and urban India is witnessing a sexual revolution of sorts. Rich kids are ramming their BMWs after a drinking binge but girls are being dragged out of pubs by self-appointed moral police. We are a nation of startling contrasts where many of us are yet to come to terms with this new emerging India.

We are beyond the point where we can discard English, because it really is a great enabler. And I suppose we will emerge stronger as a race and a nation when we treat English exactly that way – an enabler, not a labeller.

Issues

Previous Post

April 9, 2010

Be prepared to welcome 400 million refugees by 2015

Next Post

April 10, 2010 'He liked talking, writing about sex'

Browse Our Archives

Select a Category Aarti Achievement and Leadership AfPak Africa Annual and Year-end Asia Audio Australia Behavioural Sciences Bhagwad Gita Bhagwad Gita Blogging Blogs Business Business Intelligence Business Strategy Cannes Careers Chanakya China Conservation Corruption Creative Daily Links Desh Poems Development & Welfare Devotional Audio Devotional Songs Drama Earth Economics Education Entertainment Environment Europe Everyday Quotes Featured Articles Featured Songs Finance Flickr Pictures Food Geo-Political Global Warming Globalization Health & Medicine Hinduism Historic History Humour India Indian Culture Indian music Indian Weddings Israel Issues Legal Link Love Minorities Misc Motivation and Personal Development Movie Lists Movie Reviews Movies Mumbai terror attacks Natural Disasters Nature News Outsourcing Pakistan Parenting Personal Philosophy Poetry Politics Poverty Quotes Recipe Regular Blog Post Relationships Religion Religious/Spiritual Audio Sciences Showcase Slideshow South Asia Special Stories Spiritual Quotes Spirituality Sports Stories Strategy Technology Technology Terrorism Travel Uncategorized US Video Women Women_s Rights Worship Yoga

Select a Month December 2015 November 2015 October 2015 September 2015 August 2015 June 2015 April 2015 March 2015 February 2015 September 2014 August 2014 January 2014 November 2013 October 2013 September 2013 August 2013 July 2013 June 2013 April 2013 March 2013 February 2013 January 2013 December 2012 November 2012 October 2012 September 2012 August 2012 July 2012 June 2012 May 2012 April 2012 March 2012 February 2012 January 2012 December 2011 November 2011 October 2011 September 2011 August 2011 July 2011 June 2011 May 2011 April 2011 March 2011 February 2011 January 2011 December 2010 November 2010 October 2010 September 2010 August 2010 July 2010 June 2010 May 2010 April 2010 March 2010 February 2010 January 2010 December 2009 November 2009 October 2009 September 2009 August 2009 July 2009 June 2009 May 2009 April 2009 March 2009 February 2009 January 2009 December 2008 November 2008 October 2008 September 2008 August 2008 July 2008 June 2008 May 2008 April 2008 March 2008 February 2008 January 2008 December 2007 November 2007 October 2007 September 2007 August 2007 July 2007 June 2007 May 2007 April 2007 March 2007 February 2007 January 2007 December 2006 November 2006 October 2006 September 2006 August 2006 July 2006 June 2006 May 2006 April 2006 March 2006 February 2006 January 2006 December 2005 November 2005 October 2005 September 2005 August 2005

TAKE THE

Religious Wisdom Quiz

What occupation did Peter, Andrew, James, and John have before following Jesus?

Select your answer to see how you score.

Fishermen Scribes Tax collectors Politicians