Culture Cloning

Re: # 277

Ajeya:

Please control you language when you respond and expect me to respond.

BTW, please check your facts, Pune Marathi (Pune has been a center of Sanskrit), and for some reason Malyalam are much closer to Sanskrit than Hindi. Although pure Banarsi hindiwalas like to claim that hindi is direct descendent of Sanskrit, becasue Benaras has been another center of Sanskrit and Hindi. This is pure rivalry, please do more research on this. You may learn something valuable than profanity and insult.

Anil

re:#281 by Netizen
Amen to that wish of yours.
Sridhar

re:#285 by teshah
Very true!
I read a funny incidence in the book ``Freedom at midnight`` (Larry collins, Lapierre). Quaid-e-azam Jinnah was giving his first independence day speech (mostly in english with some Urdu words interspersed) and ended his speech with ``Pakistan Zindabad``. This change was so sudden that most people thought he had said ``Pakistan is in the bag``!
Sridhar

re: tahmed`s post
(But urdu in pakistan has never had that ideological push to it that hindi (i.e. thru introduction of words from a dead language, sanskrit) has had in india...)
First of all, a slight correction.
Sanksrit is not a dead language. It is still listed as one of the national languages of India by the Indian constitution (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_national_languages_of_India#Official_languages_.28Central_administrative.29). It is not widely spoken but is there are people writing books, debating in that language. Doordarshan has a daily news telecast in sanskrit. By efforts of some private individuals (see my earlier posts), one district in Karnatak has been delcared sanskrit-literate. A lot of songs in Carnatic music are sung in this language and immortalized by some greats like M.S. Subbuluxmi. So, i would be very hesitant to say this is a dead language.
You are right about the GOI`s push to make Hindi into a national language. This however ran into bad weather when South (especially TN) resisted. So, today hindi is widely spoken among masses in the North and english remains the official channel of communication between North and South. Popularity of hindi however is undeniable.
sridhar

#272-risidhar

And what an irony, it was the very Urdu which caused the breakup of `Qaide-Azam`s` Pkistan by his ill-advised promotion of Urdu which he himself could hardly speak.

#69 by bolta_aaina on November 21, 2005 0:55am PT


Nasatey in english would mean ``My Prayers for You`` i.e. Mr Prayers for your well being, good health, so on and so forth.

To say so is it a blasphmey in Islam?? Definitely not.


You don`t get it, do you?

Paki panties wouldn`t be in a knot if the dude had said ``My prayers to you``...It`s the hindoo influence they`re so uptight about...

It`s blasphemy against the idea of Pakiland...

#68 by Mantolives on November 20, 2005 11:50pm PT


I would be more worried about the destructive influence of Indian soaps like Saas bhee Kabhee Bahu thee which promote an abusive and obsessive patriarchal culture obsessed with non-classy and ostentatious show of wealth.


As opposed to a culture of getting yourself raped so you can get Canadian visas and millions of $$...

Maybe Pakiland can make a soap on that show of wealth..

Pakis are acting french..with their endless discussion of American culture...

Tahmed #256:

``the turkish ``urds`` were there in india, and gave rise to urdu, even before the mughals came to india. hindi came centuries later,``

If the Turkish ``Urds`` had not been in India, we would all be still grunting like baboons because the Turkish Urds gave rise to Urdu. And do not forget Amir Khusro. He used Urdu Script. Hindi came centuries later.

Who can argue with such twisted mind and confused logic?

Re: # 275

tahmed:

``Anyway, I wish you and rsridhar and all other chowkies a happy thanksgiving day. Let us use this occassion to thank the Lord for both hindi and urdu. :-)``

as we are discussing the turkish influence on the subcontinent, have a happy Turkey day :)

Some remixes are really works of art. I have a couple of VCD (made in Pakistan I think) of oldies like Saiyyaa.n Dill Mein Aanaa Re, Aake Phir Naa Jaanaa Re (original singer Shamshad Begum), Tere Naseeb Mein Mein Hun Ke Naheen, Mere Naseeb Mein Tu Hai Key Naheen (original singer Asha Bhosle?), etc. These are really good. But most remixes are vulgar and full of suggestive movements. Some day these good ones will be classics.

Re: # 274

tahmed:

``But urdu in pakistan has never had that ideological push to it that hindi (i.e. thru introduction of words from a dead language, sanskrit) has had in india.``

as i understand you are trying to say that current hindi is basically urdu minus the persian/arabic words, which are replaced by sanskrit/prakrit words.

don`t you think that by doing so hindi is brought back to somewhat close to the original language as it was spoken (may be like khari boli) before the addition of persian/arabic words?

i do think there is ideoloical push behind urdu too, or else why would pak have it as a national language when non-urdu speakers overwhelmed urdu speakers.

people do associate language as a part of cultural definition. in india too, tamil nadu exploded in violence when the center tried to impose hindi on them. they thought that north indians are imposing their culture on tamils.

unfortunately, urdu has been ``associated`` with muslims and hence pak accepted it as a part of its national identity whereas india favored hindi in its place.

re:#273 by anil
Hindi as a spoken language is popular even in south (thanks to bollywood) but as a literary language, there is nothing much to commend it. Neither it has the depth and sheer grandeur of sanskrit nor the beauty of urdu (even a novice like me can appreciate ghazals!). Hindi has also not grown the way it should have, considering it is constantly influenced by contact with people from non-hindi speakng regions. Tamil has many hindi words (i am not talking about sanskrit root words) like bazaar, shaabash. The word ``parwah illay`` in tamil is actually a local version of the urdu/hindi word ``parwah nahin``!
Anyway, i think the hindi purists have stifled its growth and made it too sanskritised to be of interest to some layman wanting to learn it as a literary language.
Sridhar

Re: #273 by anil

[In Hindi the emphasis had been to import from Sanskrit...]

WHY do you guys HAVE to make such moronic statements? I mean, WHY?

Hindi is a DIRECT DESCENDENT OF SANSKRIT!

And you say the ``emphasis`` has been to ``import`` (as from a different, unrelated language) from Sanskrit?

By god, HOW MUCH more idiotic can you get?

WHY do you guys say such obviously idiotic things? WHERE do you guys come from?


What SPECTACULAR idiocy! Boggles the mind!

anil#273:

I am not aware if the number of Urdu/Arabic alphaets have collapsed over time. As for Hindi, I cannot even pronounce some of the alphabets and I never see them being used. Perhaps, they are used in sanskrit.

I am personally persuaded that Urdu-Hindi are the same languages, though with different scripts. It seems important for the identity of subcontinental Muslims to think that ``their`` language, Urdu, has like themselves, roots outside India. And this is fine with me, too. What is undeniable is the beauty of Urdu and the Muslim contribution to it.

Netizen: interesting write up you provided. Thanks. I think my post to rsridhar also touches upon the issues you mention (and sorry for making the post unduly lengthy).

Anyway, I wish you and rsridhar and all other chowkies a happy thanksgiving day. Let us use this occassion to thank the Lord for both hindi and urdu. :-)

rsridhar: That quote you provide is from a website of Penn State on a section having to do with the IT aspects of providing fonts for different scripts, not on indian history. That explains the misleading generality you quote fro that website on that big bogeyman of hindu extremists - conversion of hindus to islam - which clearly has nothing to do with the basic purpose of that webpage, and has obviously been tossed in by whoever was asked to write that web page - not that anyone outside india really cares about this earthshaking issue of hindu conversions.

Let us therefore focus on the facts, rather than looking for something on the internet to support some point of view. The fact is that, like I said, urdu developed as a result of the incursions into india of turk armies. The word urdu itself is of turkish origin, meaning camp. of course Old Panjabi (or Hindustani as the englishman gilchrist called it i think, or kharri boli) was a key feed into urdu (along with turkish originally, and later persian, arabic and now english as well). Thus, urdu developed in pre-mughal times, contrary to the ``knowledge`` being shed (and put in bold) to that website. And initially it had a lot of turkish words, with persian becoming more prominent after being adopted as language of the court.

i didnt say anything about urdu being the great liberator for us pakis - I did say that we pakis have accepted urdu as our common language, and in doing so changed it from the original urdu that the urdu-speaking muhajirs had brought with them in 1947 (see my post below to dm on this). The pakistan government did try to force urdu as a national language in the beginning (mostly thanks to urdu-loving liaqat ali khan), and that was met with language riots of the early 1950`s in bengal. But urdu in pakistan has never had that ideological push to it that hindi (i.e. thru introduction of words from a dead language, sanskrit) has had in india. It has found roots in the fertile soil of the panjab, the land which has remained open to new ideas for centuries, and whose people are not a single racial group but rather (as the name panjab itself reflects) merely anyone who made the land of the five rivers their home. With musharaff (from an urdu speaking delhi family) with his panjabi-accented urdu a perfect example of this.

This is why urdu does not need the pakistan government`s support to thrive. It is now very much a part of the pakistan national identity, at least for now. Although, like i wrote earlier, ultimately both urdu and hindi are withering under a far more powerful force, namely globalization - and that is why you and i communicate in english, not in hindi or urdu.