Re: CHAT: Reformed Latin-script writing for natlangs

>From: LIJESH KRISHNAN <lijesh@...>
>At my college, which is a Regional Engineering College, (it takes half its
>students from outside Kerala) , _all_ North Indian students (including Non
>Hindi students like Bengalis), talk to each other in Hindi, but to south
>Indians like me, they speak in English (even though many of them speak
>English really badly), It's automatic. And as far as government support
>goes, officially, Hindi is supposed to replace English one day. But most
>southerners wouldn't stand for it. So things will probably remain as they
>are.
I agree.  There will always be a place for English in India.  Look at
Ireland.  Once upon a time everybody spoke Gaelic.  Then the British
invaded, and a nation which was beforehand 100% Gaelic-speaking and 100%
Roman Catholic forcefully became bilingual and bisectarian.  There will
always be Protestants in Ireland, especially in Northern Ireland(like my
ancestors the family _Mac an Mhaoir_ from County Armagh and elsewhere in
both Ulster and Scotland), and there will always be English spoken, even
though the government is heavily promoting increased use of Irish Gaelic.

But the English used in Ireland has taken a distinct form of its own; in
fact, it is considered an Irish English dialect.  Words of Gaelic origin are
copious in that form of English, and even grammatical features, even on
occasion including VSO word order and the use of verbal nouns.  It's
actually developed into TWO dialects: the more Scottish-like Northern
Hiberno-English of Ulster, and the southern dialect of Irish English.

India seems to be doing the same with English.  Tell me, is there a
difference between English spoken in the north in places like Delhi, Mumbai,
Chandigarh or Pune, and any Southern Indo-English of Madras, Hyderabad, and
of course the states of Kerala and Tamil Nadu?  Either way, I think an
Indian English dialect has arisen, so I wouldn't call it "bad English".

And look what happened in Hawai'i.  You probably know the story.

DaW.
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