I have been in Bangalore for the past few months, and I was really in awe of the cultural melting pot it is. You can find people literally from Kashmir to Kanyakumari, and Gujarat to Assam. But I am literally seeing a language going to the ruins with my own eyes, or should I say ears. It is never a good thing. And I am not entirely convinced that it is some kind of a BJP conspiracy.
Languages are a part of a demographic's identity and languages dying are sad. It makes the world a poorer place. And we are seeing a large number of languages wiped off the planet in the past century, but most of it is due to the low native population. The case I am witnessing right now is different and more long term. This is a classic case "Minority rule". The human population is a system with countless variables and interactions, making them a complex system. And when it comes to complex systems, there is something that Nassim Taleb calls the "minority rule" is at play. What it states is that a stubborn minority, when over a certain threshold (5-6 %), can shape the opinions, choices, and beliefs of a flexible majority.
This rule is quite pertinent to a lot of different places. One thing that was in front of me for all my life but I barely noticed is the ubiquity of the “Halal” meat. In Tamil Nadu, the Muslim population is barely 5 percent, but, up to my knowledge, more than 80 percent of the shops advertise their meat as Halal. Why should a devout Hindu, Christian, or an Atheist eat the Muslim sacrificial meat? It is because we don’t give a shit whether it is Muslim sacrificial meat; it isn't going to taste any different. Whereas the Muslim minority will not touch it if it not “halal”. The business people don’t want to lose the 5 percent, because the rest 95 percent don’t care. Because in a population, the majority will be complacent, and the minority will be stubborn as it ensures their survival. If the majority decides against buying Muslim sacrificial meat, halal stores will practically disappear. In this system, it is all because of Business decisions.
** I am in no way implying that I am against Halal meat - I don’t care. And if you put it the other way around, the same will happen**
Another appropriate example is the scenario when you go out with a bunch of your friends. In this case, the stupidest thing you can do is to plan on going to a pure Non-veg restaurant. No matter the day, date, time, at least 2 in 10 won’t be eating meat for one reason or the other at that particular moment. So, you decide to go to a restaurant where they provide both veg and non-veg that is invariably going to be either expensive or mediocre or both. What is happening here is that the Non-veg people don’t mind eating vegetarian, whereas the veg people are stubborn as a mule in not eating non-veg, thinking it is some kind of a higher calling. Even when organizing a party, the wisest thing to do is to cook vegetarian. I think that is probably why we have a custom of having vegetarian for most festivals and occasions.
If you are wondering what is the connection here, I can say that this is more connected to the matter at hand than anything else. In Bangalore, we have around 10-15 percent Hindi northerners, some of us, some of Kerala people, some Telegu people, some other northerners (Marathi, Punjabi, Gujarati, Kashmiri, etc), and a Kannada majority. Of the whole bunch, the Hindi speaking northerners are the most stubborn. And one cannot avoid communication with them or have all the interchanges in English. And in addition to that, the majority of people are extremely passionate about learning Hindi, whereas the minority vadakkans have no interest in learning any other language; Pride and stubbornness. The Hindi-speaking population is a little over the threshold in Bangalore. So practically everyone speaks Hindi here. I have even seen two Kannada people joking around in HINDI. What more to say than this…
When this is happening, learning Kannada becomes redundant; When everyone speaks and understands Hindi (Colloquially), what is the point in taking all the effort to learn another language which serves a similar function? Only stubbornness and pride can save a Language. Or else dominators like English and Hindi will crush them.
A few years back, I went to Germany for a competition. You can really feel the pride they have in speaking their language and not giving in to English. Even in India, all the banners and posters are bilingual; Tamil and English in our place. But in Germany, it was all in German. One can not even think of surviving there without learning the language. Even the texts in their cars' dashboards are in German. They really look at people who speak other languages as outsiders. This pride they have in speaking their language is what will make will make their language survive for centuries from now. This can be said about the Japanese too. Despite being global industrial superpowers, they didn’t cede by adopting the "Lingua Franca" English. The same cannot be said about the Kannada and the north Andhra people. And I am not conjecturing; I have spoken with several natives here on that matter and it's mostly their words. That’s why I believe Kannada cannot last a lot of generations from now.
At least that cannot be said about our us. Not yet. We have a strong Tamil culture. And we don’t even respect the northeners who come to our place and speak in Hindi thinking that Hindi is universal. That’s a good thing. Only stubbornness and pride and save Languages in this modern globalized world. So it is good to be stubborn and proud.
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