Every language has a life. Like yours and mine, but only enormously more significant. It has a present, a past and a future that transcends all the lives of its speakers. It forgets some words and traits, and develops new ones. Making their lives even more dynamic, languages influence each other every day.
The importance of a language can’t be over-emphasized. There is a philosophy which attributes languages to all evolution. Not only for a thought to be communicated, but for it to germinate and define itself in one’s mind, language is the means. So when a language disappears, some of the ideas that originated in it disappear too.
Death is another bitter truth that even languages can’t escape. We might not be able to predict a language’s death, but we can recognize the symptoms. Telugu is dying, neglected if not abandoned by its speakers.
We might not be able to say “deSa bhAShalandu telugu lessa” after a few more years. I wonder whether the letter Sa has been removed from the Telugu alphabet in our text-books already. If not today, it will be tomorrow, or the day after. Because sa, Sa, and Sha can no longer be pronounced by an average Telugu speaker with distinction.
I still remember my wonderful teachers reprimanding students who messed up with the subtle differences. Their lessons opened my eyes to see the chasms that separate one letter from another. sa, Sa and Sha are as different as triplets and get as much annoyed as Ankit gets when he is called Arpit.
You might think that I’m crying wolf, deluding like a hypochondriac. But I’ve heard youngsters say that they might not teach their children Telugu at all, that they don’t see the need. It’s a personal decision, and alas! such collective personal decisions diminish a language’s lifespan.
Unlike English, almost the only means through which Telugu reaches all of us is Cinema/TV. But when these media remain nonchalant about language, when they bring people from outside as untrained ambassadors, what we see is not our language being influenced, but invaded.
I’m not against artists singing or acting in any language of their choice. It is not new. It can add flavor. But back then, when there wasn’t a need to complain, outsiders showed a desire to learn the language, to teach the language, to understand its nuances, to preserve its greatness.
When I hear singers today, I can’t let go of the jarring words. I can’t let go of the compound words (and even just words) broken by the music directors in the name of music. And I can’t imagine how writers allow the mutilation of their words. Cacophony in the name of being true to music, while making it convenient for those involved in creating it is intolerable and disrespectful. We shouldn’t let it go, but as citizens of a country known for its tolerance we let go. We let go another language.
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