| torilaure |
Posted
on 14-Aug-03 05:07 AM
This is an article by Vibek Raj Maurya. Please post your comments!!
No other life forms have been able to express abstract concepts and thoughts as human. Language is the foundation of every culture. People invariably depend upon them for the use and transmission of the rest the culture.
There are about 6,000 languages are in use worldwide, as most linguists believe. The worlds languages are highly unevenly distributed. Four per cent of 6,000 odd languages are spoken in Europe, about 15% in Americas, 31% in Africa and 50% in Pacific and Asia. It is amazing to learn that, just two countries Papua New Guinea and Indonesia account for 25% of all languages. A plausible calculation made by renowned linguists estimate the coming century will witness the death of 90 per cent of the human language. There are three major causes for the disappearance of languages. A language dies if all the people who speak it are dead. It is thought that around 85 per cent of languages spoken are endemic, and shared by indigenous tribe. Secondly, most of the states have its national agenda a centralizing imperative that scythes through linguist multi-expressivity. And finally the most obvious factor is globalization. Languages need isolation to develop and to maintain their distinctive characteristics. When isolation ends, local languages tend to disappear along with traditional ways of life. Indigenous people and linguists are reluctant over such invasion, which put ones culture and heritage at stake. To lose an ancestral language is to weaken the links to the ancestors themselves. As languages disappear, a wealth of culture, art, and knowledge disappears with them. Language captures these values in numerous ways, as cultural values, as oral myths and folklore.
The loss of such valuable indigenous is not only the indigenous peoples loss but that of entire humankind. For instance, according to New York Botanical Gardens Institute notes, only 1,100 of the earths 265,000 species of plants have been thoroughly studied by western scientists but as many as 40,000 may have medicinal or undiscovered nutritional value for humans. Many are already used by tribal healers.
Efforts to limit language diversity are still common in most part of the world and Nepal as a state has not dare to stand out being an exception. Nepal is a highly diversified multi-linguist nation. The 2001 census has recorded 101 ethnic and caste groups and 92 languages. Major portion of Nepals population speak Nepali and Maithili, rest all others language can only make up to 8 per cent utmost. Though 70 percent of the population is divided into more than 90 groups and none have a population more than 7 percent, states apathy on propagating Khas (Nepali) language cannot be denied. Nepal Bhasha has been epitomized as a unifying factor on such a diverse land, indigenous and ethic languages are being tangential, as no other languages are officially used in government offices and organizations. This practice has helped in creating a bleak scene in Nepal; no matter what ethnicity a person belong to it, it a compulsion to learn Nepali and communicate in Nepali, as it an only official language recognized by the state. National curriculum has not acknowledged other indigenous languages in school, instead bygone Sanskrit has been forced in curriculum. The consequences of learning Sanskrit for most of the ethnic people do not produce anything but an obvious reason to fail in exams thereby getting dropped out of school. There has been quite a movements and resistance on this issue, people are still been demanding for the regional languages to be used as an official language besides Nepali, which is a reasonable demand. Indigenous knowledge vanishes when the language dies; language plays a bridging role between people and terrains they live in. Much of the cultures have been lost due the invasion of non-ethnic languages, it is a high time to that we realize much of our wisdom has already disappeared, and if acted cautiously, much of the remainder could be transformed into the generation to come.
Every individual should realize, by preserving and promoting the ethnic language one is saving unexplored human culture, wisdom and knowledge that has took thousands of years to come to this state. If neglected, we are loosing all and forever. Nationalization and globalization should not invade the ethnically diverse pockets. Days of the languages could be numbered, in a true sense, if invasion proliferates in similar pace.
Language would loose its substratum and thus the culture, if all the folk song from Nepal sounds This is a Aap, it is a pakeko. I am ko lorke joban you are lai sacheko.
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| allare |
Posted
on 14-Aug-03 05:20 AM
Quite good observation about languages worldwide. Surprised to know that there are 92 languages exist in Nepal. I doubt this. Among 101 ethnic, 92 languaes are in used is hard to digest, though might be correct.
Article does not suggest any concrete way to preserve the language and hence culture. I do not understand, how far language and culture are inter-related. Are not there newar, who knows no newari but still follow newari culture ? I would say, culture and language are tightly related but its not necessary to preserve the language to preserve the culture.
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