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Western Hindi

Western Hindi

Braj, though never a clearly defined political region in India, is considered to be the land of Krishna and is derived from the Sanksrit word vraja. Thus, Brajbhasa is the language of Braj (often considered a dialect of Hindi, and it was the language of choice of the Bhakti movement, or the neo-Vaishnavite religions, the central deity of which was Krishna. Therefore, most of the literature in this language pertains to Krishna composed in medieval times. Brajbhasa, or Brajavali was adapted to the Assamese language by Srimanta Sankardeva for his compositions in the 15th and 16th century in Assam. In the recent years, the Braj region which holds India's 5000 year old heritage has been brutally destroyed. The region lies in three states - Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh and Haryana. Sacred hill are being blasted out, groves being unlawfully cut down, beautiful & historic water reservoirs are in dilapdated condition and the holy river Yamuna is now a dead river. The irony is that the region lies within the Taj Trapezium zone and still is not being lookied after by the government of the concerned states. BUT, it is the spirit of Brajwasis (people of Braj) that is now being awakened to restore this holy region. Huge efforts are being made by [http://www.brajrakshakdal.org Braj Rakshak Dal], a voluntary oraganisation towards the revival of the 5000 year old holy region of braj.

Bibliography

- Rupert Snell, The Hindi Classical Tradition: A Braj Bhasa Reader. Includes grammar, readings and translations, and a good glossary.
- [http://www.brajrakshakdal.org Braj Rakshak Dal - The organisation that has taken a pledge to restore Braj] Category:Dialects of Hindi

Krishna

:This article is about the Hindu deity. For other meanings, see Krishna (disambiguation). Krishna (IAST , the Sanskrit for "dark" or "black"), is according to common Hindu tradition the eighth avatar of Vishnu. In Gaudiya Vaishnavism he is seen as the Supreme God. God

Major aspects

Krishna appears under many names, in a multiplicity of stories, among different cultures, and in different traditions. Sometimes these contradict each other, though there is a common core story that is central to most people's knowledge of Krishna. Among his important or celebrated aspects are:
- Govinda Krishna, the lord of the cow-herders. He is contrasted in this to his brother Balarama representing the cultivators, who is sometimes called Halayudha - 'armed with a plough'.
- Krishna the focus of devotion (the lover, the attractive one, the flute player). He is frequently shown playing the flute, attracting and bewildering the gopis of Vrindavana.
- Krishna the child (Bala Krishna). Stories of his upbringing in Gokula and Vrindavan are a staple of children's tales in India.
- The incarnation of the Supreme Being, and the divine Guru, who teaches Arjuna how to take the right action in the Bhagavad Gita.

Texts, stories, and literature

Bhagavad Gita A number of local traditions and regional deities may have been subsumed into the stories and person of Krishna. Accounts of or ballads about Krishna occur in a large number of works. These include the Mahabharata, the Bhagavad Gita, the Bhagavata Purana, and the Gita Govinda. Roughly one quarter of the Bhagavata Purana (mostly in the tenth book) is spent extolling his life and philosophy. The best known, or the most important stories of Krishna, include these:
- Krishna the butter-thief (Maakhanchor). One of the most popular children's stories is that of the butter-thief, the child stealing freshly made butter from his mother.
- The killer of Putana. She was a demoness who was sent to kill him by getting him to suckle her poisoned breasts.
- Krishna Giridhari. As a boy, he raised Govardhana hill to protect villagers from rain and flood sent by Indra.
- Govinda Krishna, the beloved of the gopis. The original stories of Krishna as a boy included his adolescent play with the Gopis or cowgirls of the village of Vrindavana. These were developed to form the basis of the Gita Govinda, and numerous other later works.
- Krishna Vaasudeva the prince, of the Yadavas at Mathura and later at Dwaraka. As a prince he was also the husband of Rukmini.
- Krishna, together with Arjuna, was responsible for the burning of the Khandava forest.
- He plays a major role in the events leading up to the Kurukshetra war in the Mahabharata, helping the Pandavas who accept him as their counsel and guide. He protects the dignity of Draupadi when Dushasana tries to strip her in the court.
- Paartha-sarathi – the charioteer of Arjuna (Paartha) during the great battle where, he instructs Arjuna in dharma and yoga in the Bhagavad Gita.

Summary of the story of Krishna

This summary is derived from the Mahabharata, and the Harivamsaparva, an addendum to it. Harivamsaparva

Birth and childhood

Krishna was of the royal family of Mathura, and was the eighth son born to the princess Devaki, and her husband Vasudeva, a noble of the court. He was born in a prison cell in Mathura, and the place of his birth is now known as Krishnajanmabhoomi, where a temple is raised in his memory. As his life was in danger from his uncle Kamsa the king, he was smuggled out to be raised by his foster parents Yashoda and Nanda in the forest at Vrindavana. Two of his siblings also survived, Balarama and Subhadra.

Boyhood and youth

He reached adulthood at Vrindavana. The original corpus of stories of his youth here include that of his life with, and his protection of, the local people. They included those of his play with the gopis of the village, including Radha, which later became known as the rasa lila.

Krishna the prince

Krishna as a young man returned to Mathura, overthrew his uncle Kamsa, and became ruler of the Yadavas at Mathura. In this period he became a friend of Arjuna and the other Pandava princes of the Kuru kingdom on the other side of the Yamuna. Later, he takes his Yadava subjects to Dwaraka (in modern Gujarat). He married Rukmini, daughter of King Bhishmaka of Vidarbha.

The Kurukshetra War

In the Mahabharata, Krishna is cousin to both sides in the war between the Pandavas and Kauravas. He asks the sides to choose between his army and himself. The Kauravas pick his army and he sides with the Pandavas. He agrees to be the chariot driver for Arjuna in the great battle. The Bhagavad Gita is the advice given to Arjuna by Krishna before the start of the battle.

The last days

Krishna rules the Yadavas at Dwaraka with his wife Rukmini. Later, the Yadavas kill themselves in infighting. Krishna dwells for a time in the forest, is shot in the foot when asleep by a hunter, and dies there.

The Bhakti traditions

Bhagavad Gita (190 BC-180 BC)
Obv: Indian god Balarama-Samkarshana, wearing an ornate headress, earrings, sword in sheath, holding a mace in his right hand and a plow-symbol in the left. Greek legend: BASILEOS AGATOKLEOUS "King Agathocles".
Rev: Indian god Vasudeva-Krishna, with ornate headdress, earrings, sword in sheath, holding sankha (pear-shaped vase) and chakra (wheel). Brahmi legend: RAJANE AGATHUKLAYASA "King Agathocles".]] Bhakti, meaning devotion, is not confined to any one deity of Hinduism. However Krishna has become the most important and popular focus of the devotional and ecstatic aspects of Hindu religion. Devotees of Krishna subscribe to the concept of lila, or divine play as the central principle of the universe. This is counterpoint to another avatar of Vishnu: Rama, "He of the straight and narrow path of maryada, or rules and regulations."

Earlier traditions

Those bhakti movements devoted to Krishna first became prominent in southern India in the late 1st millennium. Earlier works included those of the Alvar saints of the Tamil country. A major collection of their works is the Divya Prabandham.

Gita Govinda - the song of the cowherd

Certain literary works were important to later development of the bhakti traditions, including especially the Gita Govinda. This work was composed by Jayadeva in eastern India, in the 12th century. It elaborated part of the story of Krishna, and of one particular gopi, called Radha who had been a minor character in the Mahabharata. According to one interpretation of this work, Radha represented humanity, and Krishna represented divinity. The desire of Radha for Krishna can be seen as allegory of the desire of humanity for union with the godhead.

Recent Krishna bhakti movements

Later bhakti traditions include those promoted by Chaitanya Mahaprabhu (16th century in Bengal). Followers of Chaitanya maintain that he is an incarnation of Krishna. A number of modern movements belong in this tradition, including ISKCON, sometimes called the Hare Krishna movement. ISKCON has recently been participating in bringing the academic study of Krishna into western academia in the theological discourse on Krishnology.

The name

Krishnology.]] The Sanskrit name and word is written in IAST transliteration (the equivalent of Devanagari ; see Sanskrit for pronunciation.)

Krishna the Dark One

The term Krishna in Sanskrit means "black" or "dark". It is related to similar words in other Indo-European languages meaning black. The name is often translated as 'the dark one' or as 'the black one'. In depictions, Krishna often appears as a black or dark-skinned figure, for instance in the modern murtis (statues) and pictorial representations of Lord Jaganatha at Puri (Krishna as Lord of the World). In the same representations, his brother and sister are shown with a distinctly lighter complexion. Early pictorial representations also generally show him as dark or black-skinned. Rajasthani miniature paintings of the 16th century are often of a brown or black-skinned figure. However, by the 19th century, he is almost always shown as blue skinned.

Other meanings of the name

The name is sometimes said to mean dark blue, rather than black. This may be connected to the common modern practice of representing many Hindu deities with blue skin. The blue is meant to represent the deities' holy aura.
- Mahabharata, Udyogaparva 71.4, gives this analysis of the word 'Krishna': :krishir bhu-vacakah sabdo nas ca nirvriti-vacakah :tayor aikyam param brahma krishna ity abhidhiyate
- "The word 'krish' is the attractive feature of the Lord's existence, and 'na' means 'spiritual pleasure.' When the verb krish is added to na, it becomes krishna, which indicates the Absolute Truth."
- According to the Vishnu sahasranama, Krishna is the 57th name of Vishnu, and also means the "Existence of Knowledge and Bliss".
- There are [http://www.astrology.aryabhatt.com/108_Names_Krishna.asp 108 Names of Krishna] Vishnu

Other names of Krishna

He is known by numerous other names or titles. The most commonly used of these include:
- Acyutah
- Gopala - cowherd; protector of cows
- Govinda - protector of cows
- Hari - the fawn (or yellow or gold) coloured one
- Hrshikesha - master of the senses
- Jaganatha - lord of the universe (see also Juggernaut).
- Keshava – long haired; in some accounts, the killer of Kesi
- Madhava - bringer of springtime
- Panduranga
- Vaasudeva, Krishna Vaasudeva - son of Vasudeva

Chronology

A paper presented recently at a convention in Prabhas Patan near Somnath, concludes that Krishna died at the age of 125 on February 18, 3102 BC at 14:27:30 hours on the banks of river Hiran in Prabhas Patan. As the report goes, he was 125 years, 7 months and 6 days old when he left the earth for his divine abode Goloka. The finding was based on clues in the Vedic literatures. Certain dates were fed into special software which was used to prepare a kundli (astrological horoscope charts). The Bhagavata Purana and Bhagavad Gita say that Krishna "left" Dwarka 36 years after the Battle of the Mahabharata. The Matsya Purana says that Krishna was 89 years old when the battle was fought. There after Pandavas ruled for a period of 36 years, their rule was in the beginning of Kali yuga. It further says that the Kali Yuga began on the day Duryodhana was felled to ground by Bhima. Some Hindus believe that the year 2005 is the year 5106 of the Kali Yuga (which began with a year 0).

External links

- [http://www.dlshq.org/download/lordkrishna.htm Lord Krishna and His Teachings, by Swami Sivananda]
- [http://www.iskcon.com/ International Society for Krishna Consciousness]
- [http://1-krishna.com Hare Krishna ]
- [http://www.vedabase.net/kb/en Krishna's Life Story]
- [http://www.shikshapatri.org.uk/~imagedb/hms/mss_obj.php?type=biographies&id=7#a7 Lord Krishna's Biography]
- [http://www.harekrishna.com/~ara/col/books/BG/tsem1.html Gita and strong monotheism.]
- [http://krishna.org/Articles/2000/10/00147.html Questions From A Muslim With Answers From Khan]
- [http://www.krishna.com/ Krishna.com] All about Krishna. Includes information, books, MP3s, images, and radio.
- [http://www.jkp.org Jagadguru Kripalu Parishat] The homepage of the Jagadguru Kripalu Parishat, which propagates Raganuga Bhakti
- [http://www.stephen-knapp.com/sri_krishna.htm Stephen Knapp's site about Krishna.]
- [http://veda.harekrsna.cz/encyclopedia/index.htm#8 Vedic Encyclopedia] information on Krishna.
- [http://www.exoticindiaart.com/article/krishnaimage Iconographic Perception of Krishna's Image], by Dr. P. C. Jain.
- [http://veda.harekrsna.cz/encyclopedia/historical-krsna.htm Search for the Historical Krishna, by Prof. N.S. Rajaram]
- [http://www.wva-vvrs.org/ World Vaishnava Association] An Umbrella Organisation of the Vaishnava faith
- [http://www.gosai.com/chaitanya/ Sri Narasingha Chaitanya Matha] An extensive site on Gaudiya Vaishnavism
- [http://veda.harekrsna.cz/encyclopedia/krishna-archeology.htm Krishna Archeology, by Nanditha Krishna]
- [http://www.dvaita.org/shaastra/gita/gita_sara/gs-007.html Devotion and Knowledge of God's Greatness] (only one God in Hinduism, #56 and see Shri Krishna is the supreme God; #57.)
- [http://www.gitamrta.org/ Pro-Krishna site]
- [http://www.vina.cc/ VINA - Vaishnava Internet News Agency] The Official News Site of the World Vaishnava Association
- [http://bhagavadgita.swami-center.org/page_21.shtml Three Aspects of Krishna’s Teaching] Category:Mahabharata epic Category:Hindu gods category:titles and names of Krishna Category:Vaishnavism Category:Forms of Vishnu simple:Krishna

Dialect

A dialect (from the Greek word διάλεκτος, dialektos) is a variety of a language used by people from a particular geographic area. The number of speakers, and the area itself, can be of arbitrary size. It follows that a dialect for a larger area can contain plenty of (sub-) dialects, which in turn can contain dialects of yet smaller areas, et cetera. A dialect is a complete system of verbal communication (oral or signed but not necessarily written) with its own vocabulary and/or grammar. The concept of dialects can be distinguished from:—
- sociolects, which are a variety of a language spoken by a certain social stratum,
- standard languages, which are standardized for public performance (e.g. written standard), and
- jargons, which are characterized by differences in vocabulary (or lexicon according to linguist jargon). Varieties of language such as dialects, idiolects and sociolects can be distinguished not only by their vocabulary and grammar, but also by differences in phonology (including prosody). If the distinctions are limited to phonology, one often uses the term accent of a variety instead of variety or dialect.

Standard and Non-standard Dialects

A standard dialect (also known as a standardized dialect or "standard language") is a dialect that is supported by institutions. Such institutional support may include government recognition or designation; presentation as being the "correct" form of a language in schools; published grammars, dictionaries, and textbooks that set forth a "correct" spoken and written form; and an extensive formal literature that employs that dialect (prose, poetry, nonfiction, etc.). There may be multiple standard dialects associated with a language. For example, Standard American English, Standard British English, and Standard Indian English may all be said to be standard dialects of the English language. A nonstandard dialect, like a standard dialect, has a complete vocabulary, grammar, and syntax, but is not the beneficiary of institutional support.

"Dialect" or "Language"

There are no universally accepted criteria for distinguishing languages from dialects, although a number of paradigms exist, which render sometimes contradictory results. The exact distinction is therefore a subjective one, dependent on the user's frame of reference. Language varieties are often called dialects rather than languages
- solely because they are not (or not recognized as) literary languages,
- because the speakers of the given language do not have a state of their own,
- or because their language lacks prestige. The term idiom is used by some linguists instead of language or dialect when there is no need to commit oneself to any decision on the status with respect to this distinction. Anthropological linguists define dialect as the specific form of a language used by a speech community. In other words, the difference between language and dialect is the difference between the abstract or general and the concrete and particular. From this perspective, no one speaks a "language," everyone speaks a dialect of a language. Those who identify a particular dialect as the "standard" or "proper" version of a language are in fact using these terms to express a social distinction. Often, the standard language is close to the sociolect of the elite class. In groups where prestige standards play less important roles, "dialect" may simply be used to refer to subtle regional variations in linguistic practices that are considered mutually intelligible, playing an important role to place strangers, carrying the message of wherefrom a stranger originates (which quarter or district in a town, which village in a rural setting, or which province of a country); thus there are many apparent "dialects" of Slavey, for example, geographically widespread North American indigenous languages, by which the linguist simply means that there are many subtle variations among speakers who largely understand each other and recognize that they are each speaking "the same way" in a general sense. Modern day linguistics knows that the status of language is not solely determined by linguistic criteria, but it is also the result of a historical and political development. Romansh came to be a written language, and therefore it is recognized as a language, even though it is very close to the Lombardic alpine dialects. An opposite example is the case of the Chinese language whose variations are often considered dialects and not languages despite their mutual unintelligibility because they share a common literary standard and common body of literature. The Yiddish linguist Max Weinreich published the expression, "A shprakh iz a dialekt mit an armey un a flot" ("A language is a dialect with an army and a navy"), illustrating the fact that languages are created by assimilation. This is perhaps the most widely cited statement of an analogy that has been attributed to other authors. (Weinreich explicitly states that he did not coin it.) It has been suggested that the initial wording was provided by, Hubert Lyautey as, "Une langue, c'est un dialecte qui possède une armée, une marine et une aviation." ("A language is a dialect with an army, a navy and an air force." ). A separate article discusses the origin of the language-dialect aphorism in greater detail.

Political factors

Depending on political realities and ideologies, the classification of speech varieties as dialects or languages and their relationship to other varieties of speech can be controversial and the verdicts inconsistent. English and Serbo-Croatian illustrate the point. English and Serbo-Croatian each have two major variants (British and American English, and Serbian and Croatian, respectively), along with numerous lesser varieties. For political reasons, analyzing these varieties as "languages" or "dialects" yields inconsistent results: British and American English, spoken by close political and military allies, are almost universally regarded as dialects of a single language, whereas the standard languages of Serbia and Croatia, which differ from each other to a similar extent as the dialects of English, are being treated by many linguists from the region as distinct languages, largely because the two countries oscillate from being brotherly to being bitter enemies. The Serbo-Croatian language article deals with this topic much more fully. Parallel examples abound. Macedonian, although mutually intelligible with Bulgarian and often considered to be a Bulgarian dialect, is touted in Republic of Macedonia as a language in its own right. In Lebanon, the right-wing Guardians of the Cedars, a fiercely nationalistic (mainly Christian) political party which opposes the country's ties to the Arab world, is agitating for "Lebanese" to be recognized as a distinct language from Arabic and not merely a dialect, and has even advocated replacing the Arabic alphabet with a revival of the ancient Phoenician alphabet. There have been cases of a variety of speech being deliberately altered to serve political purposes. One example is Moldovan. No such language existed before 1945, and most non-Moldovan linguists remain sceptical about its classification. After the Soviet Union annexed the Romanian province of Bessarabia and renamed it Moldavia, Romanian, a Romance language, the Cyrillic alphabet was restored and numerous Slavic words were imported into the language, in an attempt to weaken any sense of shared national identity with Romania. After Moldavia won its independence in 1991 (and changed its name to Moldova), it reverted to a modified Latin alphabet as a rejection of the perceived political connotations of the Cyrillic alphabet. In 1996, however, the Moldovan parliament, citing fears of "Romanian expansionism," rejected a proposal from President Mircea Snegur to change the name of the language back to Romanian, and in 2003 a Romanian-Moldovan dictionary was published, purporting to show that the two countries speak different languages. Linguists of the Romanian Academy reacted by declaring that all the Moldovan words were also Romanian words; while in Moldova, the head of the Academy of Sciences' Institute of Linguistics, Ion Bărbuţă, described the dictionary as a politically motivated "absurdity". In contrast, spoken languages of Han Chinese are usually referred as dialects of one Chinese language, to promote national unity. The article "Is Chinese a language or a family of languages?" has more details. The significance of the political factors in any attempt at answering the question "what is a language? is great enough to cast doubt on whether any strictly linguistic definition, without a socio-cultural approach, is possible. This is illustrated by the frequency with which the army-navy aphorism discussed at the end of the preceding section is cited.

The historical linguistics point of view

Many historical linguists view every speech form as a dialect of the older medium of communication from which it developed. This point of view sees the modern Romance languages as dialects of Latin, modern Greek as a dialect of ancient Greek, and Tok Pisin as a dialect of English. This paradigm is not entirely problem-free. It sees genetic relationships as paramount; the "dialects" of a "language" (which itself may be a "dialect" of a yet older tongue) may or may not be mutually intelligible. Moreover, a parent language may spawn several "dialects" which themselves subdivide any number of times, with some "branches" of the tree changing more rapidly than others. This can give rise to the situation where two dialects (defined according to this paradigm) with a somewhat distant genetic relationship are mutually more readily comprehensible than more closely related dialects. This pattern is clearly present among the modern Romance tongues, with Italian and Spanish having a high degree of mutual comprehensibility, which neither language shares with French, despite both languages being genetically closer to French than to each other: French has undergone more rapid change than have Spanish and Italian.

Concepts in dialectology

Concepts in dialectology include:

Mutual intelligibility

Some have attempted to distinguish dialects from languages by saying that dialects are mutually comprehensible while languages are not. But this concept may not be as clear-cut as it may at first seem. Italian speakers and Spanish speakers, for example, may be able to understand a considerable proportion of each other's closely-related Romance languages, whereas Lombards and Sicilians, speaking what are described as dialects of the same language, may encounter considerable barriers to mutual comprehension.

Diglossia

Another problem occurs in the case of diglossia, used to describe a situation where, in a given society, there are two closely-related languages, one of high-prestige, which is generally used by the government and in formal texts, and one of low-prestige, which is usually the spoken vernacular tongue. An example of this is sanskrit, which was considered the proper way to speak in northern India, but only accessible by the upper class, and prakrit which was the common (and informal or slang) speech at the time.

Dialect continuum

A dialect continuum is a network of dialects in which geographically adjacent dialects are mutually comprehensible, but with comprehensibility steadily decreasing as distance between the dialects increases. A well-known example is the Afrikaans-Dutch-Frisian-German dialect continuum, a vast network of dialects with four recognized literary standards. Although standard Dutch and German are not mutually intelligible, a chain of dialects connects them, with no break in intelligibility between any geographically adjacent dialects along the continuum. A network of dialects similarly exists among the Eastern Slavic languages, among which Russian, Belarusian, and Ukrainian are recognized as three literary standards. The Serbo-Croatian language can also be viewed as a network of four major dialects and three literary standards. The Romance languages -- Portuguese, Castilian Spanish, Catalan, Provençal, French, Occitan, Corsican, Sardinian, Sicilian, Romansh, Friulian, other Italian dialects, Romanian, and others -- form another well-known continuum.

Diasystem

A diasystem refers to a single genetic language which has two or more standard forms. An example is Hindi-Urdu or Hindustani, which encompasses two main standard varieties, Urdu and Hindi.

Pluricentrism

A pluricentric language is a language with several standard versions.

The Ausbausprache - Abstandsprache - Dachsprache framework

One analytical paradigm developed by professional linguists is known as the Ausbausprache - Abstandsprache - Dachsprache framework. It has proved popular among linguists in Continental Europe, but is not so well known in English-speaking countries, especially among people who are not trained linguists. Although only one of many possible paradigms, it has the advantage of being constructed by trained linguists for the particular purpose of analyzing and categorizing varieties of speech, and has the additional merit of replacing such loaded words as "language" and "dialect" with the German terms of Ausbausprache, Abstandsprache, and Dachsprache, words that are not (yet) loaded with political, cultural, or emotional connotations. It may prove to be a tool helpful for enabling people to see some ancient and poisoned linguistic controversies through a different lens of perception.

Selected list of articles on dialects

- Varieties of Arabic
- Catalan dialect examples
- List of Chinese dialects
- List of dialects of the English language
- Flemish dialects
- Dialects of the French language
- Cypriot dialect
- Irish dialects
- Italian dialects
- Sicilian language
- Japanese dialects
- Korean dialects
- Norwegian dialects
- Gilaki and Mazandarani (Persian dialects)
- Warsaw dialect
- Portuguese dialects
- Dialects in Serbia, Croatia and Bosnia
- Slovenian dialects
- Spanish dialects and varieties
- Swedish dialects in Ostrobothnia
- Bergensk, used in Bergen, Norway

External links

- [http://www.terralingua.org/Definitions/DLangDialect.html Language or dialect?] (Terralingua)
- [http://www.ericdigests.org/pre-9215/arts.htm Incorporating Dialect Study into the Language Arts Class]
- [http://www.ericdigests.org/1997-4/dialects.htm Vernacular Dialects in U.S. Schools]
- [http://www.theverybestofstuff.de/contents/dialectology.html Fishermen's Dialect on the South-East Coast of Scotland.] Category:Language varieties and styles als:Dialekt ko:방언 ja:方言

Hindi language

left Hindi (हिन्दी) is an Indo-European language spoken mainly in North and Central India. It is part of a dialect continuum of the Indo-Aryan family, bounded on the northwest and west by Panjābī, Sindhī, and Gujarātī; on the south by Marāthī; on the southeast by Orīya; on the east by Bengālī; and on the north by Nepālī. Hindi also refers to a standardized register of Hindustani that was made one of the official languages of India. The grammatical description in this article concerns standard Hindi. Hindi is often contrasted with Urdu, another standardized form of Hindustani that is the official language of Pakistan and some states in India. The primary differences between the two are that Standard Hindi is written in Devanāgarī and has been partially purged of its Persian and Arabic vocabulary, which was replaced by words from Sanskrit; while Urdu is written in a variant of the Persian alphabet and draws heavily on Persian and Arabic vocabulary. The term "Urdu" also includes dialects of Hindustani other than the standardized languages.

Area

Hindi is the predominant language in the states and territories of Himachal Pradesh, Delhi, Haryana, Chandigarh, Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Bihar, Uttaranchal, Jharkhand, and Chattisgarh. It is spoken and understood in Gujarat, Punjab and Kashmir, states that otherwise have their own native languages. It is also widely spoken in the cities of Mumbai, Delhi, Chandigarh, Ahmedabad and Kolkata, all of which are cosmopolitan cities harbouring large communities of people from various parts of India. Local variations of Hindi are counted as minority languages in several countries, including Fiji, Mauritius, Guyana, Suriname, and Trinidad and Tobago.

Number of Speakers

Hindi in the broader sense is among the more widely spoken languages in the world. According to some estimates, about 500 million people in India and abroad are native speakers of Hindi and the total number of people who understand the language may be as high as 800 million. According to 1991 census^{[http://www.censusindia.net/cendat/language/lang_table5.PDF]} 40.22% of the Indian population can speak Hindi. More than 180 million people in India regard Standard Hindi as their mother tongue, making it the fourth-most spoken language in the world. Another 300 million use it as second language. Outside India, Hindi speakers number 8 million in Nepal, 890,000 in South Africa, 685,000 in Mauritius, 317,000 in the USA^{[http://www.census.gov/prod/2003pubs/c2kbr-29.pdf]}, 233,000 in Yemen, 147,000 in Uganda, 30,000 in Germany, 20,000 in New Zealand and 5,000 in Singapore.

History

Hindi evolved from Sanskrit, by way of the Middle Indo-Aryan prakrit languages and Apabhramsha of the Middle Ages. As a standardised register of Hindustani, Hindi became the official language^{[http://indiaimage.nic.in/languages.htm]} of India on January 26, 1965, although English and 21 other languages are recognised as official languages by the Constitution of India.

Standard Hindi

After independence of India, the Government of India worked on standardizing Hindi, and the following changes took place:
- standardization of Hindi grammar: In 1954, the Government of India set up a Committee to prepare a grammar of Hindi; The committee's report was released in 1958 as "A Basic Grammar of Modern Hindi"
- standardization of Hindi spelling
- standardization of Devanagari (Devanāgarī) script by the Central Hindi Directorate, Ministry of Education and Culture to bring about uniformity in writing and to improve the shape of some devanagari characters.
- scientific mode of scribing the Devanagari alphabet
- incorporation of diacritics to express sounds from other languages The popularity of the Urdu and Hindi languages has been helped by Bollywood (the Hindi film industry) where poetry in songs have always been dominated by Urdu. These movies are not only popular in most parts of India but also have an international appeal.

Vocabulary

Standard Hindi derives much of its formal and technical vocabulary from Sanskrit. Standard or shuddha ("pure") Hindi is used only in public addresses and radio or TV news, while the everyday spoken language in most areas is one of several varieties of Hindustani, whose vocabulary contains words drawn from Persian through Urdu. In addition, spoken Hindi uses words from English and other languages as well. Vernacular Urdu and Hindi are practically indistinguishable. However, the literary registers differ substantially; in highly formal situations, the languages are barely intelligible to speakers of the other. It bears mention that for centuries past, Sanskrit and Persian had been regarded, to a large extent regardless of their ethnic or religious background, as the languages of the elite.

Dialects

Hindi in the broad sense is a dialect continuum without clear boundaries. For example, both Nepali and Panjabi are sometimes considered to be Hindi (based on the high level of mutual intelligibility for Panjabi and Hindi especially), though they are more often considered to be separate languages. Hindi is often divided into Western Hindi and Eastern Hindi, and these are further divided. Following is a list of principal Hindi dialects; boldface indicates an idiom that often classified as a separate language.
- Hindustani, including standard Hindi (or 'High Hindi') and standard Urdu, as well as regional dialects of Urdu. Standard Hindi is the principal official languages of India, while standard Urdu is the official language of Pakistan and the state of Jammu and Kashmir. Urdu has a rich literary history, being the language of the Mughal court second only to Persian
- Khadiboli or Sarhindi, spoken in western Uttar Pradesh; the dialect that forms the basis for Standard Hindi
- Chhattisgarhi (sometimes spelled "Chattisgarhi"; also known as Lahariya or Khalwahi), spoken mostly in the recently created state of Chhattisgarh
- Bagheli, spoken mostly in the Baghelkhand region of the state of Madhya Pradesh
- Awadhi, spoken mostly in central Uttar Pradesh, the area formerly comprising the kingdom of Awadh or "Oudh"
- Fijian Hindustani, a form of Awadhi spoken by Fijians of Indian descent
- Bihari', mostly spoken in the state of Bihar, which in turn is comprised of several principal dialects:
- Angika,
- Bhojpuri
- Sarnami - a form of Bhojpuri with Awadhi influence spoken by Surinamers of Indian descent
- Maithili, now an official language of Bihar
- Magahi,
- Vajjika,
- Rajasthani, mostly spoken in the state of Rajasthan, and also comprised of several notable (sub)dialects:
- Marwari
- Mewati or "Mewari"
- Jaipuri
- Braj Bhasha, in a vaguely defined region of north central India, centered on Delhi
- Bundeli, mostly spoken in the Bundelkhand region and the Jhansi district of Uttar Pradesh
- Hariyanvi, Bangaru or Jatu, mostly spoken in the state of Haryana
- Kanauji, mostly spoken in Kanauj, Uttar Pradesh
- The Eastern Hindi dialect centered on the Hindu holy city of Varanasi in Uttar Pradesh, with a strong influence on the Sanskritized learned vocabulary of standard Hindi
- Bambaiya Hindi, the dialect of the city of Bombay (Mumbai); the basis for the language of the popular Bollywood films These dialects demonstrate a variety of influences including the adjacent Iranian, Dravidian, and Tibeto-Burman language families. Bollywood dialects: Hindi movies often use dialects to highlight the regional character of some of the roles. Some of the dialects used include
- Bhojpuri: Movie "Ganga-Jamuna"
- Bhopali: Spoken by Soorma Bhopali in "Sholay"
- "Madrasi" Hindi: Spoken by Mehmud in "Padosan"
- Rajasthani: Movie "Paheli"
- Bambaiya Hindi: used in numerous movies Needless to say, dialects used in movies are not always pure.

Sounds

There are 11 vowels and 35 consonants in Standard Hindī. They are shown below:

Vowels

Bambaiya Hindi The vowel occurs in English loans and is represented by ऐ, which was originally used in Sanskrit for the 'ai' or 'əi' diphthong. But today in Khariboli, the Standard dialect, the vowel stands for in almost all Hindi words. The other ten vowels have phonemic nasal counterparts. The vowel sequences and , both oral and nasal, also occur. Note that the short 'a', often seen at the end of masculine Sanskritized words as well as elsewhere, which makes the non-Hindi speakers to pronounce it as short or long 'a', the back vowel, is actually the neutral vowel schwa 'ə'. The short vowel 'e' as in English 'set' also occurs at some places in urban Hindi in place of schwa, like "rehnā" (रहना. to live), but there is no diacritic to mark it.

Consonants

Hindi has a large consonant system, with about 38 distinct consonant phonemes. An exact number cannot be given, since the regional varieties of Hindi differ in the details of their consonant repertoire. To what extent certain sounds that appear only in foreign words should be considered part of Standard Hindi is also a matter of debate. The traditional core of the consonant system, inherited from Sanskrit, consists of a matrix of 25 plosives and 8 sonorants and fricatives. The system is filled out by 7 sounds that originated in Persian, but are now considered Hindi sounds. The 25 plosives occur in five groups, with each group sharing the same position of articulation. These positions in their traditional order are: velar, retroflex, palatal, dental, and bilabial. In each position, there are five varieties of consonant, with four oral stops and one nasal stop. An oral stop may be voiced, aspirated, both, or neither. This four-way opposition is the hardest aspect of Hindi pronunciation for a speaker of English. The voiced, unaspirated consonants are the easiest for English-speakers to pronounce. The initial sounds of "get", "jet", "debt", and "bet" are perfect examples of the velar, palatal, dental, and bilabial positions, respectively. The apico-domal or retroflex position is the hardest for an English speaker: the apex of the tongue must be curled backward and brought into contact with the dome of the palate, well behind the gum-line. In casual Hindi, however, bringing the tongue slightly above the alveolar ridge will also do. The voiceless, unaspirated consonants are similar to those in French or in English words like "skin", "spin", and "stand". Aspirated voiceless consonants are similar to those in the English words "pat", "cat", "chat", and "tap" (though they are typically more heavily aspirated than in English). The voiced, aspirated consonants are the hardest to pronounce, but can be approximated by following the unaspirated version with an audible "h" sound. The nasal sounds are the same as in English. The 4 resonants are y, r, l, and v. These are similar to English, except that r is a tap as in Spanish, not an approximant, and v is usually between English "v" and "w", though it may vary as either of those English sounds. The native fricatives of Hindi are s and sh, which are pronounced as in English. There is also a breathy voice which is generally considered a fricative as well, and it is more or less like English "h" in "home". There is a fourth fricative in the orthography, written ष, which is sometimes transcribed as "ssa" or "sha2". It was originally pronounced as in Sanskrit, and still is to some extent, but in many modern Hindi speakers it has merged with .

Borrowed Sounds

The khutma or Nukta, a dot placed below various consonant letters, indicates Persian and English sounds that are not present in Sanskrit. The sounds f, z, rd, and rdh are found only in loanwords. The first two are as in English. The latter two are retroflex taps, and never begin a word. The additional sounds //, //, and // may be found in some loanwords. Some of the borrowed sounds are difficult for Hindi speakers to pronounce and many Hindi speakers will simply ignore the dot and pronounce the word as if it wasn't there.

Writing system

The Devanagari script represents the sounds of spoken Hindi very closely, so that a person who knows the Devanagari letters can sound out a written Hindī text comprehensibly, even without knowing what the words mean.
- The anuswara (dot placed above a vowel) may represent one of these consonants: rda, nda, na, ma. These are pronounced after the vowel. This style is deprecated.
- The visarga (:) placed after a vowel represents ha.
- The anuswara (.) and visarga (:) are often included in list of vowel letters, but according to the standardized form of Hindi, they are consonants.
- A chandra-bindu sign is placed above a vowel to indicate nasalized vowel (anunasika).
- An ardha chandra-bindu placed above the vowel aa indicates 'o' sound of English (as in "office", "college"). Some people also use this sign, placed above a, to indicate 'e' (as in "bet") sound of English.

Grammar

Hindi grammar can be very complex and is different in many ways from what English speakers are used to. A simple and obvious difference is that for expressing relationship of nouns, Hindi uses postpositions where English would use a preposition. Other differences include gender, honorifics, interrogatives, word order, use of cases, and different tenses. While being complicated, Hindi grammar is fairly regular, with irregularities being relatively limited. Despite differences in vocabulary and writing, Hindi grammar is nearly identical with Urdu. The concept of punctuation having been entirely unknown before the advent of the Europeans, Hindi punctuation uses western conventions for commas, exclamation points, and question marks. Periods are sometimes used to end a sentence, though the traditional "full stop" (a vertical line) is more generally used. Nouns in Hindi have gender, and are either masculine or feminine. There are no overall rules for whether a word will be masculine or feminine so they simply need to be memorized. Adjectives and verbs agree in gender and number with nouns, so proper use of gender is required for conversation. Many masculine nouns end in a long aa (आ) sound and many feminine nouns end in a long ii (ई) sound, though many nouns will have neither of those endings and exceptions occur even for common words. All inanimate objects are either male or female; again, there is neither a neuter gender nor any rule that governs the established "sex" of inanimates Besides the standard interrogative terms of who, what, why, when, where, how, how many, what type, etc, the Hindi word kyaa (क्या), which can also mean "what", can be used as a generic interrogative often placed at the beginning of a sentence to turn a statement into a question. This makes it clear when a question is being asked. Questions can also be formed simply by modifying intonation, exactly as English some questions are. Hindi has three levels of honorifics, or politeness. As reflected in the personal pronoun "you", aap (आप) is the most formal and respectful; tum (तुम) is mid level and usual; and tu (तू) is very informal, verging on the impolite. "Aap" is grammatically plural like the English "you"; adjective and verb agreement follows that. Imperatives (commands or suggestions) typically have four levels, the first three corresponding to the three levels of honorifics, and the last expressing an additional level of politeness akin to "would you be so kind as to..." that might be used in English. The "tu" imperative is simply the verb stem formed by removing the infinitive particle "na". The "tum" imperative is formed by adding "o" to the verb stem, and the "aap" imperative is formed by adding "ie" or "iye" to the stem. The additional form adds "gaa" to the "aap" form. Because imperatives can already include politeness, the word "kripaya", which can be translated as "please", is much less common than in spoken English; it is generally only used in writing, and its use in common speech is usually intended as mockery.

Word order

The standard word order in Hindi is, in general, Subject Object Verb, but where different emphasis or more complex structure is needed, this rule is very easily set aside. More specifically, the standard order is 1) Subject 2) Adverbs (in their standard order) 3) Indirect object and any of its adjectives 4) Direct object and any of its adjectives 5) Negation term or interrogative, if any, and finally the 6) Verb and any auxiliary verbs. (Snell, p93) The standard order can be modified in various ways to impart emphasis on particular parts of the sentence. Negation is formed by adding the word "nahiin" ("no"), in the appropriate place in the sentence, or by utilizing the particle "na" in some cases.

Common tenses and aspect

Some of the most common verb tenses include the present imperfect, present continuous, past imperfect, past continuous, past perfect, and future. Present imperfect is used for habitual actions or states of being. The present continuous is used for ongoing actions, while the past continuous reflects actions that were occurring at a particular time. The past imperfect is used for past habitual actions or conditions, while the past perfect reflects completed actions and has three forms including simple past perfect and two forms akin to where English would use have or had [done]. See also: Grammatical aspect.

Case

Nouns in Hindi have two cases, the direct and the oblique. The direct case is the standard form of the noun as found in the dictionary; the oblique is the form that is used along with postpositions, such as in "in the room". For example, the direct form of the word "room" is "kamraa"; in the oblique, it is "kamrey". So "in the room" is "kamrey maen". Pronouns also change in the oblique in similar fashion, and some interrogatives have oblique forms.

Literature

Main article: Hindi literature The beginnings of Hindi literature can be traced to the Prakrits of classical Sanskrit plays. Tulasidas's Ramacharitamanas attained wide popularity. Modern litterateurs include Jaishankar Prasad, Sumitranandan Pant, Maithili Sharan Gupta, Suryakant Tripathi 'Nirala', Mahadevi Varma, Sachchidananda Hirananda Vatsyayana 'Ajneya' and Munshi Premchand.

Common difficulties faced in learning Hindi

- the phonetic mechanism of some sounds peculiar to Hindi (eg. rda, dha etc) The distinction between aspirated and unaspirated consonants will be difficult for English speakers. In addition, the distinction between dental and alveoloar (or retroflex) consonants will also pose problems. English speakers will find that they need to carefully distinguish between four different d-sounds and four different t-sounds.
- Even pronunciation of vowels: In English, unstressed vowels tend to have a "schwa" quality. The pronunciation of such vowels in English is changed to an "uh" sound; this is called reducing a vowel sound. The second syllable of "unify" is pronounced "uh" not "ee." The same for the unstressed second syllabe of "person" which is also pronounced "uh" rather than "oh." In Hindi, English-speakers must constantly be careful not to reduce these vowels.
- In this respect, probably the most important mistake would be for English speakers to reduce final "ah" sounds to "uh." This can be especially important because an English pronunciation will lead to misunderstandings about grammar and gender. In Hindi, "vo bolta hai" is "he talks" whereas "vo bolti hai" is "she talks." A typical English pronunciation in the first sentence would be "vo boltuh hai," which will be understood as "she talks" by most Hindi-native speakers.
- The 'a' ending of many Sanskrit and Sanskrit borrowed gender-masculine words, due to Romanization, is highly confused by non-native speakers. It should never be pronounced as long back vowel "ā", but as the neutral schwa "ə". In Sanskrit, the so-written "Shiva (शिव)" should be pronounced as "Shivə" and never "Shivā", as the latter stands for the the feminine derivative of "Shiva" (compare Phillip-Phillipa), and could be understood to refer to Parvati, the wife of Shiva. In Hindi, the ending 'ə' of such masculine words is altogether dropped, or pronounced very feebly if the penultimate consonant is a cluster of two or more consonants. eg. In Hindi, "Shiva" is "Shiv", "Krishna" is usually "Krishn", "dharma" is "dhərm", "karma" is "kərm", "VaruNa" is "VəruN", etc. There are exceptions, of course, if the devanagari script itself dictates the additional diacritical mark for the vowel "ā" at the end of certain masculine words, like Brahmā (ब्रह्मा).
- the Verbal concordance; Hindi exhibits split ergativity; see Ergative-absolutive language for an example.
- Postpositions (ne)
- Relative-correlative constructions. In English interrogative and relative pronouns are the same word. In "Who are you?" the word "who" is an interrogative, or question, pronoun. In "My friend who lives in Chicago can speak Hindi," the word "who" is not an interrogative, or question, pronoun. It is a relative, or linking, pronoun. We find this pattern with other words: where, when, why, etc. are used both to ask questions and to link words. In Hindi, there are different words for each. The interrogative pronoun tends to start with the "k" sound:" kab = when?, kahaaN = where?, kitna = how much? The relative pronouns are usually very similar but start with "j" sounds: jab = when, jahaaN = where, jitna = how much. Hindi uses these j-sound pronouns where English uses relative pronouns and clauses. In English we say, "I study where she studies" but in Hindi we say this differently. "jahaaN vo padhti hai (she studies) vahaaN main padhta hoon (I study)." Here "jahaaN" means "where" and "vahaaN" means there.
- Honorifics. For many English speakers, the fact that Hindi uses a three-part system of honorifics in the second person pronoun ("you") is deeply mystifying. It shouldn't be. The more formal pronouns are used in situations in which it's proper to express a degree of social respect. The less formal pronouns depart from this and indicate, on the one hand, intimacy, or on the other, an absence of social respect. The most formal is "aap" and is the safest for foreigners to use in all situations. It is used in situations that range from deeply respectful to the merely businesslike. When first meeting adults, whether at the bank, hotel or a restaurant, we should use "aap." The more intimate "tum" would be acceptable in talking with children or with adults with whom one is on more intimate terms. The safest thing with adults is wait and see what pronoun they use with you. They will almost certainly start off with "aap," but might, over time, start to use "tum" if your relationship becomes more like that of close friends. If your Hindi is too weak to determine whether they are using "aap" or "tum," then by all means, you should use "aap." Many grammars say that foreigners will rarely have the chance to use "tum" with Indian colleagues, but that is true only if one behaves like a "memsahib" or "sahib." The most intimate pronoun is "tu", which is only used in situations where there is a total absence of human formality: it is used in addressing servants, very close friends and younger siblings. The use of "tu" with another adult may express the intimacy of lovers (but even here "tum" is safer) or extraordinary anger. What's the connection? All of these situations involve the lack of social respect.
- Direct and Oblique inflections
- Optative and Conditional moods
- Compound verbs

References

- Snell, Rupert Teach yourself Hindi: A complete guide for beginners. Lincolnwood, IL : NTC Publishing Group, 1992. ISBN 0844238635
- Taj, Afroz (2002) http://www.ncsu.edu/project/hindi_lessons/ A door into Hindi. Retrieved November 8, 2005.

External links

- [http://labnol.blogspot.com/2005/06/free-software-tools-and-fonts-cd.html Request free Hindi Fonts and Devanagari Tools CD from Indian Government]
- [http://www.it-c.dk/people/pfw/hindi/ A short introduction to Hindi grammar]
- [http://hi.wiktionary.org Hindi Wiktionary]
- [http://www.ethnologue.org/show_language.asp?code=HND Ethnologue on Hindi]
- [http://www.lorem-ipsum.info/_hindi Generator for Hindi typographical filler text]
- [http://www.cs.colostate.edu/~malaiya/hindilinks.html Hindi Language Resources]
- [http://sanskrit.gde.to/hindi Hindi documents and dictionary]
- [http://ltrc.iiit.net/showfile.php?filename=downloads/ International Institute of Information Technologies IIIT], online and downloadable dictionaries cross referenced in English for Hindi, Marathi, Punjabi, Bengali, Kannada, Telugu languages. Includes Classical Hindi Literature, writings of Meera, Suradas, Tulasidas, Premchand, Rahim et cetera.
- [http://www.aczone.com/itrans/online/ Online Itrans] to generate Hindi/Devanagari output.
- [http://www.goidirectory.nic.in Government of India website]
- [http://www.unicode.org/charts/PDF/U0900.pdf Official Unicode Chart for Hindi (PDF)]
- [http://www.bhashaindia.com Website of Microsoft to Provide Solutions for Hindi Language on net]
- [http://www.iit.edu/~laksvij/language/hindi.html Romanized to Unicode Hindi transliterator]
- [http://www.wordanywhere.com Hindi Dictionary]
- [http://www.websters-online-dictionary.org/definition/Hindi-english/ Hindi English Dictionary] from [http://www.websters-online-dictionary.org Webster's Online Dictionary] - the Rosetta Edition Category:Languages of India Category:Hindi ko:힌디어 ja:ヒンディー語 simple:Hindi

Assamese language

Assamese (অসমীয়া) or Asamiya or Oxomiya is the language spoken by some of the natives of the state of Assam in northeast India. It is also the official language of Assam. It is spoken in parts of Arunachal Pradesh and other northeast Indian states. Small pockets of Assamese speakers can be found in Bhutan and Bangladesh. Immigrants from Assam have carried the language with them to other parts of the world. The eastern most of Indo-European languages, it is spoken by over 20 million people.

Formation of Assamese

Assamese and the cognate languages, Bengali and Oriya, developed from Magadhi apabhramsa, the eastern branch of the apabhramsa that followed Prakrit. Written records in an earlier form of the Assamese script can be traced to 6th/7th century AD when Kamarupa (part of present-day Assam was a part of ancient Kamarupa) was ruled by the Varman dynasty. Assamese language features have been discovered in the 9th century Charyapada, which are Buddhist verses discovered in 1911 in Nepal, and which came from the end of the Apabhramsa period. Earliest examples of the language appeared in the early 14th century, composed during the reign of the Kamata king Durlabhnarayana. Since the time of the Charyapada over the passage of the centuries it has been influenced by the languages belonging to the Tibeto-Burmese and Austric families giving it a characteristic expressiveness and charm.

Writing

There is a strong tradition of writing from early times. Examples can be seen in edicts, land grants and copper plates of medieval kings. Assam had its own system of writing on the bark of the saanchi tree in which religious texts and chronicles were written. The Assamese script traces its ancestry to Nagari, an earlier form of Devanagari script which is used in India's national language Hindi. The spellings in Assamese are not necessarily phonetic. Hemkosh, the second Assamese dictionary, introduced spellings based on Sanskrit which are now the standard.

Phonetics

The Assamese phonetic inventory consists of eight oral vowel phonemes, three nasalized vowel phonemes, fifteen diphthongs (two nasalized diphthongs) and twenty-one consonant phonemes [http://www.iitg.ernet.in/rcilts/asamiya.htm]. Assamese phonetics has two distinguishing features vis-à-vis the other Indic languages of the Indo-European family: the complete absence of the retroflex sound which is particularly strong in Dravidian languages, and strong in Sanskrit; and the presence of the voiceless velar fricative [http://www.iitg.ernet.in/rcilts/Wave/word/assamese/X.wav] which is completely absent in the present forms of other Indian languages. As an example of the second, some Assamese prefer Oxomiya to Asomiya while writing the name of their language to denote the sound, represented by 'x' in the International Phonetic Alphabet. This sound present in the Proto-Indo-European language and in old (Vedic) Sanskrit disappeared in classical Sanskrit. In the Assamese context, the sound is the result of a process of lenition. Dr. Rabin Deka has demonstrated using modern algorithms and technology currently available in Digital Signal Processing discipline that the phoneme /x/ as defined by International Phonetic Alphabet is not same as that of the three phonemes produced by the some native Assamese speakers see Talk:Assamese_language for his original research). Some variation of the sound is expected within different population groups and dialects.

Dialects

In the middle of the 19th century the dialect spoken in the Sibsagar area came into focus because it was made the official language of the state by the British and because the Christian missionaries based their work in this region. Now the Assamese spoken in and around Guwahati, located geographically in the middle of the Assamese spoken region, is accepted as the standard Assamese. The Assamese taught in schools and used in newspapers today has evolved and incorporated elements from different dialects of the language. Banikanta Kakati identified two dialects which he named (1) Eastern and (2) Western dialects. However, recent linguistic studies have identified four dialect groups [http://www.iitg.ernet.in/rcilts/asamiya.htm] (Moral 1992), listed below from east to west:
- Eastern group, spoken in and other districts around Sibsagar district
- Central group spoken in present Nagaon district and adjoining areas
- Kamrupi group spoken in undivided Kamrup, Nalbari, Barpeta, Darrang, Kokrajhar and Bongaigaon districts
- Goalparia group spoken in Goalpara, Dhubri, Kokrajhar and Bongaigoan districts

History

The history of the Assamese language may be broadly divided into three periods:

Early Assamese (6th to 15th century AD)

This period may again be split into (a) Pre–Vaishnavite and (b) Vaishnative sub-periods. The earliest known Assamese writer is Hema Saraswati, who wrote a small poem "Prahrada Charita". In the time of the king Indranarayana (1350-1365) of Kamatapur the two poets Harihara Vipra and Kaviratna Saraswati composed Asvamedha Parva and Jayadratha Vadha respectively. Another poet named Rudra Kandali translated Drona Parva into Assamese. But the most well-known poet of the Pre-Vaishnavite sub period is Madhava Kandali, who rendered the entire Ramayana into Assamese verse under the patronage of Mahamanikya, a Kachari king of Jayantapura. Hema Saraswati introduced himself in his writing as Vaishnava born in Kamrup or Kamarupa. The language he used is not Assamese but Kamrupi, this is the case with Madhava Kandali too.

Middle Assamese (17th to 19th Century AD)

This is a period of the prose chronicles (Buranji) of the Ahom court. The Ahoms had brought with them an instinct for historical writings. In the Ahom court, historical chronicles were at first composed in their original Tibeto-Chinese language, but when the Ahom rulers adopted Assamese as the court language, historical chronicles began to be written in Assamese. From the beginning of the seventeenth century onwards, court chronicles were written in large numbers. These chronicles or buranjis, as they were called by the Ahoms, broke away from the style of the religious writers. The language is essentially modern except for slight alterations in grammar and spelling.

Modern Assamese

Influence of Missionaries

The modern Assamese period began with the publication of the Bible in Assamese prose by the American Baptist Missionaries in 1819. The currently prevalent standard Asamiya has its roots in the Sibsagar dialect of Eastern Assam. As mentioned in Bani Kanta Kakati's "Assamese, its Formation and Development" (1941, Published by Sree Khagendra Narayan Dutta Baruah, LBS Publications, G.N. Bordoloi Road, Gauhati-1, Assam, India) – " The Missionaries made Sibsagar in Eastern Assam the centre of their activities and used the dialect of Sibsagar for their literary purposes". The American Baptist Missionaries were the first to use this dialect in translating the Bible in 1813. These Missionaries established the first printing press in Sibsagar in 1836 and started using the local Asamiya dialect for writing purposes. In 1846 they started a monthly periodical called Arunodoi, and in 1848, Nathan Brown published the first book on Assamese Grammar. The Missionaries published the first Assamese-English Dictionary compiled by M. Bronson in 1867.

Effect of British rule

The British imposed Bengali in Assam after the state was occupied in 1826. Due to a sustained campaign, Assamese was reinstated in 1872 as the state language. Since the initial printing and literary activity occurred in eastern Assam, the Eastern dialect was introduced in schools, courts and offices and soon came to be formally recognized as the Standard Assamese. In recent times, with the growth of Guwahati as the political and commercial center of Assam, the Standard Assamese has moved away from its roots in the Eastern dialect.

Beginning of Modern Literature

The period of modern literature began with the publication the Assamese journal Jonaki (1889), which introduced the short story form first by Laxminath Bezbarua. Thus began the Jonaki period of Assamese literature. In 1894 Rajanikanta Bordoloi published the first Assamese novel Mirijiyori. The modern Assamese literature has been enriched by the works of Jyoti Prasad Agarwalla, Hem Barua and others. In 1917 the Asom Sahitya Sabha was formed as a guardian of the Assamese society and the forum for the development of Assamese language and literature. The word Assamese is an English one, built on the same principle as Cingalese, Canarese, etc. It is based on the English word Assam by which the tract consisting of the Brahmaputra valley is known. But the people themselves call their state Asam and their language Asamiya.

References

# Moral, Dipankar. A phonology of Asamiya Dialects : Contemporary Standard and Mayong, PhD Thesis, Deccan College, Pune 1992. # RCTILS, IIT Guwahati, [http://www.iitg.ernet.in/rcilts/asamiya.htm]

External links

- [http://www.geocities.com/bipuljyoti/authors/jyotiprasad.html The Creative Visionary: Jyoti Prasad Agarwalla (1903-1951)]
- [http://www.assam.org/assam/language/assamlang.html Assamese Language and Literature ]
- [http://www.neerh.8m.net/ Assamese Poems ]
- [http://www.devainet.cjb.net/ Assamese Poems in Assamese]
- [http://www.language-museum.com/a/assamese.php Assamese Language Sample]
- [http://www.ethnologue.com/show_language.asp?code=ASM Ethnologue report for Assamese]
- [http://www.xophura.org/ Xophura - Collection of writings in Assamese] Category:Indo-Aryan languages Category:Languages of India Category:Languages of Bangladesh

Srimanta Sankardeva

Mohapurusa Srimanta Sankaradeva (1449-1569) is a colossal figure in the cultural and religious history of Assam, a state in India. He initiated the bhakti movement in that region and named it ek sarana naam dharma. He used the form of Krishna to talk about only God, who can be worshipped solely by uttering his name. In contrast to other bhakti movement forms, his religion follows the dasa attitude (a slave to God). Radha is not worshipped along with Krishna. After his death, his movement fractured. Some of the fractions worship the idol of Krishna, while others do not worship any idols. It is not his religious teachings alone that make him a colossus, but his oeuvre in literature and the performing arts. He was the fountainhead of the Ankiya naat, a form of drama; Bargeets a form of devotional songs that he composed and set to music; Sattriya dance, that Sankaradeva initiated and which was later developed by monastries. These cultural traditions form a rich heritage of the Assamese people. Category:Assam

Assam

Assam (অসম) is a northeastern state of India with its capital at Dispur. Located just below the eastern Himalayan foothills, it is surrounded by the other northeastern states: Arunachal Pradesh, Nagaland, Manipur, Mizoram, Tripura and Meghalaya. Assam and its commercial capital Guwahati form the gateway to the northeastern states, together called the seven sisters. These states are connected to the rest of India via Assam's border with West Bengal and a narrow strip called the "Chicken's Neck." Assam shares international borders with Bhutan and Bangladesh.

Origin of name

The land of Assam was known by various names in the past---Pragjyotishpura in ancient Hindu scriptures like the Mahabharata, and Kamarupa in the early medieval times. After the decline of the Kamarupa kingdom in the 12th century, the land that included a part of the old Kamarupa kingdom and regions to the east of it was ruled by a Shan people, who called themselves Tai, but who were called Ahoms by the others. This kingdom lasted for nearly 600 years. Satyendra Nath Sarma writes [Assamese Literature, Harrassowitz, Wiesbaden, 1976]:

While the Shan invaders called themselves Tai, they came to be referred to as Āsām, Āsam and sometimes as Acam by the indigenous people of the country. The modern Assamese word Āhom by which the Tai people are known is derived from Āsām or Āsam. The epithet applied to the Shan conquerors was subsequently transferred to the country over which they ruled and thus the name Kāmarūpa was replaced by Āsām, which ultimately took the Sanskritized form Asama, meaning "unequalled, peerless or uneven" [Banikanta Kakati: Assamese: Its Formation and Development, p2]

Early documented mentions

Therefore, the name Assam is of relatively recent origin. One of the first unambiguous references come from Thomas Bowrey in 1663 about Mir Jhumla's death: "They lost the best of Nabobs, the Kingdome of Acham, and, by consequence, many large priviledges" (Bowrey, Thomas, A Geographical Account of Countries around Bay of Bengal, ed Temple, R. C., Hakluyt Society's Publications). Tavernier's "Travels in India", published in 1676 uses the spelling "Assen" for Assam in the French original. The official chronicler of Mir Jhumla too calls the place "Asam" (The Indian Antiquary, July 1887, pp222-226). Most scholars accept that the first known mention of the word Assam today is in a stanza from the Assamese Bhagavad Puran composed/translated about the middle of the 16th century which described the ethnic groups of the region (Srimadbhagavad, skandha 2, H Duttabaruah and Co., Nalbari, pp-38) transcribed in [http://www.aczoom.com/itrans/#itransencoding iTrans]: kiraTa kachhaari khaachi gaaro miri yavana ka~Nka govaala | asama maluka dhobaa ye turuka kubaacha mlechchha chaNDaala ||

Later adoption

After the fall of the Ahoms and the conquest by the British in 1826, "Assam" was used to denote first the principality of the erstwhile Ahoms, and later the British province. Soon, the province was expanded to include regions that were not part of historical Ahom kingdom. The boundaries of Assam have been redrawn many times after that, but the name Assam remained.

Other mentions

The word asama or assama was used during the time while Bhaskarvarman ruled Kamarupa. Then the present upper Assam used to emit poisonous gasses and was uninhabitable. Some of the Kamrupi criminals escaped to this land during those days in order to avoid punishment, as reported in the travel notes of the Chinese traveler Xuanzang. Those people were also called asama or assama. Xuanzang not traveling back via this route returning to China was because he was worried about attacks from asama or assama people. In Kamrupi, the term can also mean one who is not comparable with, in addition to weird/sinner, but no yester year Kamrupi scriptures referred the land asama or asam or asom. The British general did not choose the name from any of the above, but concatenated it from the scientific name “Anthera Assama”, i.e., he dropped “Anthera” and “a” of “Assama”. This was done for the first time while British created “Upper Assam State” after the “Yandabu Accord”. Anthera Assama was discovered long before the Yandabu Accord, and assama here implies unequal or not comparable with – assama was chosen as part of the scientific name because the silkworm can only live in the climate of foothills of Eastern Himalaya.an as thing.

Geography

T-shaped, the state consists of the northern Brahmaputra valley, the middle Karbi and Cachar hills and the southern Barak Valley. It experiences heavy rainfall between March and September, with very high humidity in the summer months. The temperatures are generally mild, never extreme during any season. Assam is very rich in vegetation, forests and wildlife. Lumber was once a lucrative business, until it was declared illegal by the Supreme Court of India. The region also has a number of reserved forests, and one of them, Kaziranga, is the home of the rare Indian Rhinoceros. The state produces a lot of Bamboo, although the bamboo industry is still nascent. The wildlife, forests and flora, rivers and waterways, have great natural beauty, providing growth in tourism. High rainfall, deforestation, and other factors have resulted in annual floods that cause widespread loss of life, livelihood and property. An earthquake prone region, Assam has experienced two large earthquakes: 1897 (8.1 on the Richter scale) and 1950 (8.6). Assam is divided into 23 districts: Barpeta, Bongaigaon, Cachar, Darrang, Dhemaji, Dhubri, Dibrugarh, Goalpara, Golaghat, Hailakandi, Jorhat, Kamrup, Karbi Anglong, Karimganj, Kokrajhar, Lakhimpur, Marigaon, Nagaon, Nalbari, North Cachar Hills, Sibsagar, Sonitpur, and Tinsukia.

Demographics

Assam is a multiethnic society. Forty five different languages are spoken by different communities in Assam. The state is the meeting place of three major language families: Austro-Asiatic (5), Tibeto-Burman (24) and Indo-Aryan (12). Three of the spoken languages do not fall in these families. There is a high degree of bilingualism. The number of ethnic communities in the state is very large. The People of India project (POI) has studied 115 communities. Of these 79 (69%) identify themselves regionally, 22 (19%) identify themselves locally, and 3 communities identify themselves transnationally. The benefit of development in Assam is relatively evenly spread. It has a larger representation of leadership in panchayat and regional levels and a relative gender equality.

History

Pre-historic and ancient Assam

Assam and adjoining regions have evidence of human settlement from all periods of the Stone ages. That the known hills settlements belonged to earlier periods may suggest that the valleys were populated later, or it may reflect sampling bias due to mountainous areas being more likely to remain less disturbed over long stretches of time. The earliest ruler according to legend was a mlechchha (non-Aryan) ruler named Mahiranga (sanskritized form of the Tibeto-Burman name Mairang). He was followed by others in his line: Hatakasura, Sambarasura, Ratnasura and Ghatakasura. Naraka removed this line of rulers and established his own dynasty. Historians consider Naraka's victory over the mlechchha rulers to mark the beginning of sanskritization in this region. The Naraka king mentioned at various places in Kalika Purana, Mahabharata and Ramayana covering a wide period of time were probably different rulers from the same dynasty. Kalika Purana, a sanskrit text compiled in Assam in the 9th and 10th century, mentions that the last of the Naraka rulers, Narakasura, was slain by Krishna. His son Bhagadatta, mentioned in the Mahabharata, fought for the Kauravas in the battle of Kurushetra with an army of kiratas, chinas and dwellers of the eastern coast. Later rulers of Kamarupa frequently drew their lineage from the Naraka rulers.

Medieval Assam

Medieval Assam was known as Kamarupa or Kamata, and was ruled by many dynasties. Chief among them was the Varman Dynasty (350-650). During the rule of the greatest of the Varman kings, Bhaskarvarman (600-650), a contemporary of Harshavardhana of Kanauj, the Chinese traveler Xuanzang visited the region, and recorded his travels. The other dynasties that ruled the region were the Kacharis, the Chutias etc. that belonged to the Indo-Tibetan groups. Two later kingdoms left the biggest impact in the region. The Ahoms, a Tai group, ruled eastern Assam for nearly 600 years (1228-1826). The Koch, a Tibeto-Burmese/Dravidian group, established their sovereignty in 1510 which later extended to western Assam and northern Bengal. The Koch kingdom later split into two. The western kingdom became a vassal of the Moghuls whereas the eastern kingdom became an Ahom satellite state. In spite of numerous invasions from the west, mostly by Muslim rulers, no western power could establish its rule in Assam until the advent of the British. The most successful invader was Mir Jhumla, a governor of Aurangzeb, who briefly occupied Gargaon the then capital of the Ahoms (1662-1663). He found it difficult to control the people, who carried on guerilla attacks on his forces and forced his army to leave the region. The last attempt by the Moghuls under the command of Raja Ram Singh resulted in the victory for the Ahoms at Saraighat (1671) under the Ahom general Lachit Borphukan.

British conquest

Ahom palace intrigue (and political turmoil resulting from the Moamoria rebellion) aided the expansionist Burmese ruler of Ava to invade Assam and install a puppet king in 1821. With the Burmese having reached the doorsteps of the East India Company's borders, the First Anglo-Burmese War ensued, in which Assam was one of the sectors. The war ended with the Treaty of Yandaboo in 1826, and the East India Company took control of the region. Under British Administration, Assam was made a part of the British India province called the Bengal Presidency. Sometime about 1905-1912, Assam was separated and erected as a separate province of Assam. At the time of independence of India, it consisted of the original Ahom kingdom, the present-day Arunachal Pradesh (North East Frontier Agency), Naga Hills, original Kachari kingdom, Lushai Hills, and Garo, Khasi and Jaintia Hills. Of the Assam province on the eve of Independence, Sylhet choose to join Pakistan in a referendum; and the two princely states Manipur and Tripura became Group C provinces. The capital was Shillong.

Post independence

After the independence from British rule in 1947, Assam spawned four more states to become one of the seven sister states in the 1960s and 1970s. The new states were Arunachal Pradesh, Nagaland, Mizoram and Meghalaya. The capital of Assam, which was in Shillong, had to be moved to Dispur, now a part of an expanding Guwahati. In 1961, the Government of Assam passed a legislature making the usage of Assamese language compulsary. The legislature resulted in widespread protest across Assam. In one such incident, 11 people were killed due to police firing in Silchar in southern Assam. Coming under intense pressure, the Government withdrew the legislature. In the 1980s the Brahmaputra valley saw a six-year Assam Agitation that began non-violently but became increasingly violent. The movement was triggered by the discovery of a sudden rise in electorates in electoral rolls. The movement tried to force the government to identify and deport foreigners who, the natives maintained, are illegally inundating the land from neighboring Bangladesh and changing the demographics. Critics called it a xenophobic reaction of a racist people. The agitation ended after an accord between the leaders of the agitation and the Union Government. Most of the accord remains unimplemented today, a cause for a simmering discontent. This was followed by demands for greater autonomy especially by the Bodos in the later 1980s and 1990s. The period also saw the growth of armed secessionist groups like United Liberation Front of Asom (ULFA) and National Democratic Front of Bodoland (NDFB). The union government responded by deploying the Indian army to control the situation in November 1990, leading to claims of human rights violations. The Indian army deployment has now been institutionalized under a Unified Command. Worsening inter-ethnic relationships also marked this period. The 2000s saw inter-ethnic killings, especially in the Karbi and Cachar hills (e.g the Hmar-Dimasa conflict).

Languages

Assamese and Bodo are the official languages of the state. Linguistically modern Assamese traces its roots to eastern Magahi Prakrit, with strong influences from the Tibeto-Burman and Mon-Khmer languages which are spoken by ethnic groups in the region. Bodo is a Tibeto-Burman language. Bengali (Sylheti) is the dominant language in the Barak valley. Nepali and Hindi are other important languages spoken in the state.

Culture

Assamese culture is a rich conglomerate of ethnic practices and assimilated beliefs. When the Ahoms entered the region in 1228, they had their own cultural features. Over the six centuries of their rule, they adopted the local language, religion and cultural customs, and embellished it with their own to such an extent that it puts them apart from medieval rulers of India. This is one reason why Assamese culture is so rich in heritage and values.

Gamosa

The Gamosa is an article of great significance for the people of Assam. Literally translated, it means 'something to wipe the body with' (Ga=body, mosa=to wipe); interpreting the word “gamosa” as the body-wiping towel is misleading. It is generally a white rectangular piece of cloth with primarily a red border on three sides and red woven motifs on the fourth (in addition to red, other colors are also used). Though it is used daily to wipe the body after a bath (an act of purification), the use is not restricted to this. It is used by the farmer as a waistcloth (tongali) or a loincloth (suriya); a Bihu dancer wraps it around the head with a fluffy knot. It is hung around the neck at the prayer hall and was thrown over the shoulder in the past to signify social status. Guests are welcomed with the offering of a gamosa and tamul (betel nut) and elders are offered gamosas (bihuwaan) during Bihu. It is used to cover the altar at the prayer hall or cover the scriptures. An object of reverence is never placed on the bare ground, but always on a gamosa. One can therefore, very well say, that the gamosa symbolizes the life and culture of Assam. The word gamosa is derived from the Kamrupi word gaamasa (gaama+chadar), the cloth used to cover the Bhagavad Purana at the altar. The equivalent word in Oriya is spelled as gaamu + cha = gamucha. Significantly the gamosa is used equally by all irrespective of religious and ethnic backgrounds.

Bihu

Bihu is the national festival of Assam. Primarily a festival celebrated to mark the seasons and the significant points of a cultivator's life over a yearly cycle, in recent times the form and nature of celebration has changed with the growth of urban centers. A non-religious festival, all communities---religious or ethnic---take part in it. Three Bihus are celebrated: rongali, celebrates the coming of spring and the beginning of the sowing season; kongali, the barren bihu when the fields are lush but the barns are empty; and the bhogali, the thanksgiving when the crops have been harvested and the barns are full.

Durga Puja

Other than Bihu, Durga Puja is also celebrated in Assam with great pomp and splendour, although this might be a cultural effect of the millions of Bengali people living in the state. Even then, the entire state rejoices during Durga Puja, which signifies the victory of good over evil.

Music

Assam, being the home to many ethnic groups and different cultures, is very rich is folk music. The indigenous folk music has in turn influenced the growth of a modern idiom, that finds expression in the music of such artists like Rudra Baruah, Parbati Prasad Baruah, Jayanta Hazarika, Bhupen Hazarika, Khagen Mahanta among many others. See also Music of Assam.

Economic activity

Assam tea

Assam's biggest contribution to the world is its tea. Assam produces some of the finest teas in the world (see Assam tea). Other than the Chinese tea variety Camellia sinensis, Assam is the only region in the world that has its own variety of tea, called Camellia assamica. Assam tea is grown at elevations near sea level, giving it a malty sweetness and an earthy flavor, as opposed to the more floral aroma of highland (e.g. Darjeeling, Taiwanese) teas. The tea industry developed by the British planters brought in labor from Bihar and Orissa and their descendents form a significant demographic group in the state.

Assam oil

Assam also produces crude oil and natural gas. Assam is the second place in the world (after Titusville in the United States) where petroleum was discovered. The second oldest oil well in the world still produces crude oil. Most of the oilfields of Assam are located in the Upper Assam region of the Brahmaputra Valley.

Problems in Assam

The region was part of the British Empire and most of the nationalities of this region were integrated peacefully into the new country. Unfortunately economic indexes of the region, which were above average before independence, began to fall compared to the rest of the country. Militant groups began forming along ethnic lin