5 ms·

Bhojpuri, Maithili, Haryanwi, Braj, Bundelkhandi, dialects from Rajasthan, Himachal and so and so forth, and I'll say even Khari boli are all dialects of Hindi.

by yumraj 6y ago

Bhojpuri, Maithili, Haryanwi, Braj, Bundelkhandi, dialects from Rajasthan, Himachal and so and so forth, and I'll say even Khari boli are all dialects of Hindi. We may not be able to have a fluent conversation, but for most part we'll understand the context and will be able to speak. In fact Hindi dialects change every 100km or so I'll say in the Hindi belt. Punjabi, Gujrati, Marathi and others (picking from areas neighboring the Hindi belt) are not dialects, they are languages, even though from that list Gujrati and Marathi use Devnagri script (or very close to it).

mistrial9 6y ago
hmm American here - but I vaguely recall.. Gurmukhi is a variation on Punjabi, used by Sikhs for religious purposes, but Urdu is a 'persianized' version of Hindi (?) Checking wikipedia, it mentions a "Punjabi diaspora family of languages." These distinctions seem understandable and interesting to me, of European descent and non-political. thanks yumraj, for the many posts here today on this, it feels important at some basic level. I enjoyed reading "In Search of the Cradle of Civilization" long ago.. and studied personally with one of the authors, in California. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subhash_Kak#In_Search_of_the_Cradle_of_Civilization https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subhash_Kak#In_Search_of_the_C...
- yumraj 6y ago
  Gurmukhi is the script used to write Punjabi, at least in India. It was created by a Sikh Guru. Link: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gurmukhi https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gurmukhi Interestingly, Pakistan has a state called Punjab where Punjabi is the main language, but I’m not sure what script they use. Regarding Hindi and Urdu, I found the wikipedia page to at least be informative. Link: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hindi%E2%80%93Urdu_controversy https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hindi%E2%80%93Urdu_controver...
  - valarauko 6y ago
    Pakistani Punjabi uses the Shahmukhi script, which is based on the Perso-Arabic script.
    - yumraj 6y ago
      Thanks. So, Punjabi must be one of those rare languages that is written in two entirely different scripts by roughly equal population sizes. Are there any other examples of such a language?
      - valarauko 6y ago
        There are, with many more examples historically. Konkani in the Devanagari script is an official language of India & the state language of Goa - while Christian Konkanis (a sizable proportion of the population) prefer to write it in the Latin script. Kashmiri Pundits used the Sharda script, while Muslim Kashmiris wrote it in the Persian script. Historically, the picture is more complicated. People were familiar with multiple scripts, and shifted across them based on context and jargon. For example, when the British took Sindh from the Nawab, they found the natives writing the same language in multiple scripts. The administration of the erswhile Nawab worked in Persian, while merchants used Khudabadi, a landa script related to Gurmukhi. They found that women in the home preferred the Devanagari script, as did the priestly class. Since the British were most concerned with the needs of the Persianate clerks, they mandated that Sindhi only in the Persian script would be taught in schools. You will find similar situations across India, with people adopting scripts geared towards the audience they were writing to, rather than an exclusive formalized script unique to a language. Literate Medieval Indian would be fluent in multiple languages and scripts, and combined them in interesting ways. On a tangent, I recall an argument by Bhagat Singh that the different languages of India should adopt a common script to foster unity - Devanagari in his opinion.
hawk_ 6y ago
Italians can understand Spanish quite well and vice versa. Similar for Portuguese. That doesn't make them dialects of Latin.
- yumraj 6y ago
  I can understand some Punjabi, and given context might be able to guess Gujrati, Marathi, Bangla due to their origin in Sanskrit, but I did call them separate languages. The ones I mentioned as dialects are indeed dialects, at least per commonly accepted standards.
bakul 6y ago
Gujarati has its own script, fairly similar to Devanagari but without the horizontal bar above letters and a few more changes. Marathi uses Devanagari. I believe both Urdu and Hindi came from Hindustani which was derived from Khari Boli.
- valarauko 6y ago
  On the issue of scripts, the matter was more fluid some generations ago. Different people would adopt different scripts in different circumstances, and it was the British push for standardization that settled the matter. For example, when the British took Sindh, they found that officials of the erstwhile Nawab administration used the Persian script, while merchants used the Khudabadi landa script. Women and priests, however, largely used the Devanagari script. The British adopted the Persian script for Sindhi since the clerks they absorbed used it. A similar story played out with Marathi. From the time of the Marathas till as late as the 1920s, Marathi was written formally in the Modi (ie, twisted) script. The British pushed for the adoption of the Devanagari script, since it would simplify logistics at printing presses.
valarauko 6y ago
More likely, people speaking different dialects will adopt a standard register to communicate with each other. For example, I have seen Himachali speakers from neighbouring districts communicate with each other exclusively using Khariboli Hindi, rather than their native Himachali dialects. This is probably true of most large, diverse languages. Each dialect has drifted sufficiently far from each other than while it is possible to communicate with other dialects, it's most convenient to use the shared formalized standard register. So while a Malvani speaker can largely comprehend the dialect of somebody from Gadchiroli, more often both speakers will switch to the standard Marathi register they learnt in school.

by yumraj 6y ago

mistrial9 6y ago

hmm American here - but I vaguely recall.. Gurmukhi is a variation on Punjabi, used by Sikhs for religious purposes, but Urdu is a 'persianized' version of Hindi (?) Checking wikipedia, it mentions a "Punjabi diaspora family of languages." These distinctions seem understandable and interesting to me, of European descent and non-political. thanks yumraj, for the many posts here today on this, it feels important at some basic level. I enjoyed reading "In Search of the Cradle of Civilization" long ago.. and studied personally with one of the authors, in California. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subhash_Kak#In_Search_of_the_Cradle_of_Civilization https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subhash_Kak#In_Search_of_the_C...

yumraj 6y ago
Gurmukhi is the script used to write Punjabi, at least in India. It was created by a Sikh Guru. Link: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gurmukhi https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gurmukhi Interestingly, Pakistan has a state called Punjab where Punjabi is the main language, but I’m not sure what script they use. Regarding Hindi and Urdu, I found the wikipedia page to at least be informative. Link: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hindi%E2%80%93Urdu_controversy https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hindi%E2%80%93Urdu_controver...
- valarauko 6y ago
  Pakistani Punjabi uses the Shahmukhi script, which is based on the Perso-Arabic script.
  - yumraj 6y ago
    Thanks. So, Punjabi must be one of those rare languages that is written in two entirely different scripts by roughly equal population sizes. Are there any other examples of such a language?
    - valarauko 6y ago
      There are, with many more examples historically. Konkani in the Devanagari script is an official language of India & the state language of Goa - while Christian Konkanis (a sizable proportion of the population) prefer to write it in the Latin script. Kashmiri Pundits used the Sharda script, while Muslim Kashmiris wrote it in the Persian script. Historically, the picture is more complicated. People were familiar with multiple scripts, and shifted across them based on context and jargon. For example, when the British took Sindh from the Nawab, they found the natives writing the same language in multiple scripts. The administration of the erswhile Nawab worked in Persian, while merchants used Khudabadi, a landa script related to Gurmukhi. They found that women in the home preferred the Devanagari script, as did the priestly class. Since the British were most concerned with the needs of the Persianate clerks, they mandated that Sindhi only in the Persian script would be taught in schools. You will find similar situations across India, with people adopting scripts geared towards the audience they were writing to, rather than an exclusive formalized script unique to a language. Literate Medieval Indian would be fluent in multiple languages and scripts, and combined them in interesting ways. On a tangent, I recall an argument by Bhagat Singh that the different languages of India should adopt a common script to foster unity - Devanagari in his opinion.

hawk_ 6y ago

Italians can understand Spanish quite well and vice versa. Similar for Portuguese. That doesn't make them dialects of Latin.

yumraj 6y ago
I can understand some Punjabi, and given context might be able to guess Gujrati, Marathi, Bangla due to their origin in Sanskrit, but I did call them separate languages. The ones I mentioned as dialects are indeed dialects, at least per commonly accepted standards.

bakul 6y ago

Gujarati has its own script, fairly similar to Devanagari but without the horizontal bar above letters and a few more changes. Marathi uses Devanagari. I believe both Urdu and Hindi came from Hindustani which was derived from Khari Boli.

valarauko 6y ago
On the issue of scripts, the matter was more fluid some generations ago. Different people would adopt different scripts in different circumstances, and it was the British push for standardization that settled the matter. For example, when the British took Sindh, they found that officials of the erstwhile Nawab administration used the Persian script, while merchants used the Khudabadi landa script. Women and priests, however, largely used the Devanagari script. The British adopted the Persian script for Sindhi since the clerks they absorbed used it. A similar story played out with Marathi. From the time of the Marathas till as late as the 1920s, Marathi was written formally in the Modi (ie, twisted) script. The British pushed for the adoption of the Devanagari script, since it would simplify logistics at printing presses.

valarauko 6y ago

More likely, people speaking different dialects will adopt a standard register to communicate with each other. For example, I have seen Himachali speakers from neighbouring districts communicate with each other exclusively using Khariboli Hindi, rather than their native Himachali dialects. This is probably true of most large, diverse languages. Each dialect has drifted sufficiently far from each other than while it is possible to communicate with other dialects, it's most convenient to use the shared formalized standard register. So while a Malvani speaker can largely comprehend the dialect of somebody from Gadchiroli, more often both speakers will switch to the standard Marathi register they learnt in school.