India has a country of 22 distinct languages- with each state, district and side speaking a different version of the language they understand as theirs. Yet, interestingly, none are recognized as the national language. In fact, the Government of India recognizes only two languages as Standard Languages- Hindi, and, interestingly, English.
I have found that many people are unaware of the fact that English is as much of a primary language for many Indians as their native language. Many of us, including me, went to school in English, and many of us even speak English with a greater fluency than we do Hindi. I have seen students struggle with Hindi-Language exams, yet able to process the same thoughts fluidly and fluently in English.
This is a topic that has always intrigued me, and I have often wondered what makes a language a specific community’s, and how it shapes their identity. Thus, the Gussenhoven article gave me an unintuitive yet complete picture of the speech production process. It provided a complete understanding of the physicality of speech and voice production, a topic I was almost entirely unaware of. I had always considered language to be an entirely natural notion, yet never understood the complexity of it. Perhaps the first point I found surprising was that there are no organs made for speech, yet they aid in the articulation of speech. As the chapter went on, I was intrigued to learn the role of vowels, consonants, creaky voice, whispers- realizing that the role they played in both the languages I speak- English and Hindi- was so drastically different. This came to light further on the discussion of the breathy voice and its difference in the Indian subcontinent versus Europe. Gussenhoven’s article also made me think about tone languages- and how moving from India has impacted my tone of speech rather than the actual language I speak, which was English then too.
Where Gussenhoven’s article made me think about the physicality of language, I was further intrigued to find that Kenstowicz distinguished between phonology and phonetics and that “we are in general unconscious of these rules”, yet if someone doesn’t follow them, they sound funny. This point was reiterated for me by the difference between phonological and phonetic representations, and the point that it takes phonetic training for English speakers to realise the difference in t in stake and take- something I have thought about yet never manages to put in words.For me, this summed up the many travels my family encouraged when we were younger- speaking the same language across the country, yet sounding funny, or different than the locals. It helped me place both language and phonetics in a geological framework.
Hey Vasundhara,
ReplyDeleteI found your blog post particularly intriguing because of your references to Hindi and your comments on geographic effect on dialect. I've lived many places across the United States and London, so regional dialects are of particular interest to me.
As someone who grew up speaking Hindi, do you find yourself more attuned to the aspirated and non-aspirated t's and d's in English? I found distinguishing those sounds in Hindi to be particularly difficult for me, so I'm curious if a native Hindi speaker is more aware of these different sounds in other languages.