Views of a Nepali Economist

Evolution of a language

Last week, I was in Boudha, in a clothing store. Two girls entered the shop, and started checking out discounted jackets while talking to each other. I kept looking in their direction with fascination. These girls were talking in a mix of Nepali-English-Tibetan with occasional Hindi thrown in while talking to the Madhesi shopkeeper. Only in a multi-ethnic, multi-lingual country like Nepal would scenes like that even be possible.

Purists hate it when people mix languages to create something new. English language scholars in the United Kingdom keep fuming over Hinglish that has been introduced by immigrants from South Asia. For these critics, the worst news is that the other segment of the population seems to have embraced Hinglish easily. The BBC has reported that badmash and timepass have replaced their English counterparts in everyday speech in the UK these days. Non-South Asian children in the UK have started using the word katti to their friends with a thumb on their chins, indicating that they’re no longer friends. “Isn’t it?” has simply been replaced with “no?” in the typical South Asian way. 

While English language puritans in the UK are irritated due to the rise of Hinglish, they need not worry about the demise of their traditional language. Since English is spoken by a huge proportion of the people in this planet, traditional English will survive another thousand years. However, it is not the same with German. According to German language puritans, the language mixing phenomenon has endangered the survival of the German language.

The Economist has reported the rise of a new urban language, Kiezdeutsch, has irritated German language purists. It fuses German, English, Turkish, Arabic and other languages to create a melting pot of languages. To understand it, one would have to live in Germany’s multi-lingual urban communities. German kids these days use words like musstu (mix of English words “must” and “you”), lan (Turkish word for “dude”), and yalla (Arabic for “come on”) that has the puritans in fits. 

I remember myself, during my high-school days, noticing that for those of us who came from outside the valley, it was strange to see our classmates from the valley use so many English words in a Nepali sentence. Conversely, our classmates from the valley felt that those from western Nepal talked too politely, and those from eastern Nepal talked too flamboyantly. They could not understand why those from Biratnagar frequently used made-up words like aanch (meaning “wow”) and not-so-made-up phrases like baal chhaina (meaning “don’t care”) in our sentences.

I think what the purists forget in the language discussions is the fact that the world today is a lot different than the one where they grew up. It is one thing to reminisce the language they learnt and another to be practical about the evolution of language. They should realize that the English they call “traditional” is actually radically different from the English used by, say, William Shakespeare. 

When Shakespeare was churning out literary classics, he was also churning out “made-up” words—words that did not exist at that time and place. Today, we cannot imagine an English language without Shakespeare-invented words like assassinate, luggage, blanket, dawn, arouse, cake, champion, and many others. English language purists during Shakespeare’s time would have grinded a lot of gears hating Shakespeare for inventing new words. Oh, and just in case the critics today do not know, the word “critic” itself was invented by Shakespeare.

Language is like a landscape. Passage of time through history constantly changes it. It constantly evolves. There are hundreds of words in English that have become extinct because they are no longer relevant or have been replaced by easier and better words. Similarly, the English language, in its true global nature, keeps embracing new and better words from other languages. Words like guru and pundit have been borrowed from Sanskrit (the oldest living language), and popularized by English (the most dynamic and evolving language).

Therefore, critics of Hinglish or Kiezdeutsch need not worry. English and German languages are evolving according to time just like all other languages around the world, including our very own Nepali language. The real reason to worry would have been if these languages were not constantly evolving.

We should realize that all languages were “invented” by different groups of people living in different parts of the world. They were invented as means of communication, and there is no doubt that they have proven to be effective means through the ages. So, when language puritans argue about preservation, they argue as if the languages in their current form are the “end” result. They’re not. Languages are still a “means” to communicate, and not the “end” of communication. Therefore, by their very nature, they need to evolve through time.

Bringing this matter closer to home, there is an ongoing debate in Nepal today regarding preservation of ethnic languages. The Rai community wants to preserve their language, but cannot decide which version to preserve. There are at least a dozen different dialects of the “Rai language”. I have a Rai colleague whose parents are both Rai. However, they speak different dialects of the same Rai language. As a result, they resort to talking in Nepali to understand one another. The same is true of Nepali, as well. Nepali spoken in the far-west is much different than that spoken in the east and center.

Since “communication” is the main purpose of a language, if a language that is better at communicating evolves, it replaces the older languages. We have seen that happen in South Asia where Sanskrit is on the verge of being extinct as a spoken language. Our languages served us well when we were living as isolated tribes. But, the world has grown smaller now. Therefore, just like in biological evolution, only the strongest and the fittest will survive. Sadly, this means that languages spoken by huge majorities will survive, leaving thousands of beautiful languages spoken by smaller minorities around the world to become extinct.