Murder of a Mother Tongue

Jaya Jagannath,

With the growing westernization and decaying loyalty towards mother tongue, Odia language the pedigree of Odisha is facing a breathless choke of survival. The future of Odia language became a hot topic of discussion among the intelligentsia and has raised the hackles of linguists and politicians. Odia medium schools are closing up in Odisha due to either too less or even none getting admitted for an academic session. Though Orissa is the first state in India to be formed on linguistic lines, use of Odia language in communication is quite poor in education as well as in administration.

Odia language is a rich indigenous script of 51 Letters ( 12 Vowels, 39 Consonants ), Verb endings possibly from Prakrit, later influenced by Sanskrit, ritual object names acquired from Pali. Modern Odia has lack of use of the old words and is now heavily Sanskritized. New nouns have been imported from the occupying rulers like Moghuls, Marathi and English. Strange hybrid words are lately created by Odia speakers without reference to Odia literature.

Murder of a mother tongue :
Language death is a social phenomenon, triggered by lack of social interest. A language fades away because it does not fulfill the social needs of the community who speaks it. Alarmingly the attitude towards Odia language among the elitist classes is not very positive, which threats the survivability of Odia as a language. On the one hand they talk about the strong Odia tradition and on the other hand, they do not want their children to study Odia. They feel that the Odia language does not offer a prestigious social status.

when a language dies it is not because a community has forgotten how to speak, but because another language has gradually ousted the old one as the dominant language, for political and social reasons. The consensus among intellectuals is that Odia language is slowly decaying out as the elite mass, specially the younger children, prefers to speak and write in English, ignoring their native tongue.

Why English is more preferred :
Elite people feel that English is More prestigious, the language of Science and Technology, power and politics and of global communication, very developed language, rich vocabulary, the most easily available language in the world, the international link language, a language of sophistication, English language offers greater mobility, self-confidence, enhancing self-esteem and better future prospects. As today's scenario demands globalization, it is highly essential to be more proficient in English. Social changes usually start from the elite and spread towards the general public.

Survival of Odia language :
Any ancient language has a great chance of survival only when it is used in education and in administration. Typically kids learn a language from their parents as a mother tongue, but get exposed to another more fashionable and socially useful language at school. Any way to save Odia language, planners must consider the following :

• To develop richness in vocabulary and wider functions for the use of Odia.
• To give more prestige to the native elements of the language and even to revive the obsolete forms with new modern connotation.
• To develop the terminology from science and technology and make the language as the language of power and development.
• To stop infiltration of external foreign elements into Odia and develop the written literature.
• To develop positive attitude towards Odia among younger people and to stimulate motivation in them to learn and speak this language.
• To make the literature of science and technology of other developed languages available in Odia through machine translation.
• To popularize the Odia language through mass media like Internet and mobile phone by creating good work of art in Odia

To Conclude :
Language planners and policy makers must take note of the current situation as an impending terror that will attack the Odia language, and try to develop the language to fulfill the social needs of the future generation. Today when education system is divorcing the language slowly, massive revival would be required to withstand the competition of survival against expressive literature. Should we not react and respond today to save our mother tongue, this generation will be ever blamed as murderers of their own mother tongue. All we need to do is to add an unflappability to our mother tongue. Jaya Jagannath.

Regards
Team Nilachakra