A few thoughts on Palana's weekend thoughts & others
Nasy Sankagiri
I read with great interest Palana's proposal on bringing out dictionaries
of Telugu maanDaleekaalu, and the resulting discussion. I wish to share
with you some of my thoughts on a few points which struck me as
significant:
Palana suggested making of maanDaleeka dictionaries with a view to preserve
them. The obvious question, which I think Kondalarao raised, does
generation of dictionaries preserve a maanDaleekam, or for that matter, a
language? My own guess: it will and it won't: it will preserve it in the
sense of preserving the records of its existence. It won't preserve them in
the sense of daily usage. After all, maanDaleekam results from the daily
talk of the people of a particular region. If there is a change in the way
people talk, then dictionaries cannot force them to talk in the old way.
Nor can literature! However, I found that cinema (and may be TV too) does
have an effect on the way people talk: In the olden days, movie characters
spoke mostly without accent. In the more recent movies, when some
interesting characters sported a peculiar accent - eg. kOTa Sreenivaasarao
in pretighaTana, people from other parts of AP also become familiar with
that accent, and may even imitate it.
There are already quite a few scholarly works on the various telugu
maanDaleekaalu. Some of these feature extensive lexicographies. (If any one
is interested, I can provide a brief review of the material available to
me). There are also quite a few writers who employed maanDaleekaalu in
their stories and novels very tastefully. However, both these forms, I
think, fail to sustain the usage of maanDaleekaalu in daily usage. Only
visual media have that power. After all, the main purpose of language is
communication, and there is no doubt that it is a dynamic thing. If people,
in general, do not want to speak in their own language, no amount of even
government power, let alone scholarly efforts, will convince them to do so!
Palana's second thoughts on the topic were more to the point: a maanDaleeka
dictionary will definitely help the reader/listener enjoy the material
more. Apart from that, the importance of such dictionaries in keeping a
record of the language can not be questioned.
Most of the remaining discussion went on to the matters such as teaching
telugu to the kids in the US. Well, that is a matter of personal choice.
People have to feel the need to preserve their language, culture and all
the stuff that goes with them. If they feel the need, they will find the
time and the energy. What we can do as a community is to provide the
children with opportunities to display their talent, and to encourage them
in this effort. I know a lot of kids around here who can speak telugu very
well, but don't either due to shyness or they just feel funny. I have also
seen several second generation telugu americans taking part in our stage
competitions (in plays and light music) and doing extremely well. How did
they manage it? I also find a new interest among the second generation to
find out more about their native culture - a prime example is Amar
Kosaraju's essay "Am I Hindu?" (yes, religion is a part of the culture too)
which appeared in a recent TANA Patrika as well as in the TAGDV Souvenir.
Children have a great aptitude for languages - it is upto us to feed that
interest. It is great if supplemental material such as books, tapes and
videos are available. However, these are only supplemental - the main
effort has to come from the parents, and then from the community.
A last note on B.Akki Raju's recent post:
>Here : Q 1: Why should we create a new word ? Instead
> We can addopt the same word into our Lang !
> Q 2: If we got to intoduce a new word into the
> lang., what should be the criterion ? Who
> should be allowed to do that ?
>
>I think the answer for first question is... we shouldn't
>addopt words from aliens like English or other Europion
>languages. Because our origin (I mean Telugu's) is
>definetely not that. (I know the BEERAKAYA PEECHU
>relation of Telugu to Europion languages via Sanskrit).
There are already scores of words adopted from English into telugu. And
many other words which one may presume to be neat telugu have been adopted
from urdu, maraThee etc. This adoption is as natural as the dynamic changes
in the language - no imposition of rules can contain that! We talked about
adopting foreign word vs. coining new telugu words sometime ago on this
forum when Prof. Vemuri Rao requested some translations for insurance
related terms. I am reminded of ghTOtkaca's dialog in mAyAbazAr -
"pANDityam kannaa jnAnamE mukhyam".! If it serves to convey the meaning
more effectively, to more number of people, then foriegn words are just
fine.
>Its now totally mixed up in AP. So the language
>is gradually taking a shape which everyone can
>understand. This is very much automatic and we cannot
>and need not stop.
I confess I failed to understand what the author meant by these statements.
Isn't the spoken language always understood by everybody, at least in that
geographical area? Also, the mANDaleekam emphasized by Palana goes beyond
mere accent - it incorporates special words and idioms peculiar to that
region which may not be intelligible to people from other areas.
This concludes this long post. Like Bapa Rao said, I hope I also have
collected some credits in terms of the screen lengths:-)
Comments and criticisms welcome.
Regards
Nasy
B. Akki Raju
On Tue, 21 May 1996, Nasy Sankagiri wrote:
>
> There are already scores of words adopted from English into telugu. And
> many other words which one may presume to be neat telugu have been adopted
> from urdu, maraThee etc. This adoption is as natural as the dynamic changes
> in the language - no imposition of rules can contain that! We talked about
> adopting foreign word vs. coining new telugu words sometime ago on this
> forum when Prof. Vemuri Rao requested some translations for insurance
> related terms. I am reminded of ghTOtkaca's dialog in mAyAbazAr -
> "pANDityam kannaa jnAnamE mukhyam".! If it serves to convey the meaning
> more effectively, to more number of people, then foriegn words are just
> fine.
I am aware of this fact that other lang words are already present
in Telugu. (I quoted Bus and Express as examples). As you (Nasy)
said we may not be able stop this by imposing any rules. But why
can't we make an attempt to coin a new word and spread it ? In Tamil
nadu the new word coined for 'Express' was written on all the
express buses (instead of writing Express). I personally believe
such an attempt would certainly make a difference. Definetely by imposing
rules we cannot make anything possible.
I remember in our post graduation class amongst our telugu circle
we used to have competions like how long one can talk without using
a word from differnt lang. Almost all the time we ended up with arguments
whether a perticular word can be treated as telugu or not. Example
one girl used the word 'glass'. I wanted to oppose this... but I don't
have a ready word for this. May be what you are saying is true that
we cannot stop other lang (especially English) coming into Telugu. But
I don't want to believe that.... I don't wish that will happen.
The very nature of Telugu (the way it sounds... apreciated by every one
as the sweetest) may be affected by this. (Am I sounding emotional...
I am, no doubt).
I joined telusa just 2 months back and so Iam not aware of the fact that
this has already been discussed. Please excuse me if I had lead the whole
group back to the same point where you all left long back.
>
> >Its now totally mixed up in AP. So the language
> >is gradually taking a shape which everyone can
> >understand. This is very much automatic and we cannot
> >and need not stop.
>
> I confess I failed to understand what the author meant by these statements.
> Isn't the spoken language always understood by everybody, at least in that
> geographical area? Also, the mANDaleekam emphasized by Palana goes beyond
> mere accent - it incorporates special words and idioms peculiar to that
> region which may not be intelligible to people from other areas.
>
I am sorry... I am not a regular writer. May be I was not clear. I will
try to explain what I meant by this. Always all the time spoken lang was
understood by all the people throught AP. (I should have been more
careful
in writing this... I confess). What I meant was... some of the words
(may be because of their origin) used in some of the regions are not very
easy to understand for the people in the other regions.
Ex : In Hyderabad you must have heard Auto walas complaining about
"bonDalu" present on the road. (He means "gotulu") Say this in
Vijayawada and see the reaction.
"Nallla" in Hyd is not understood as "pampu" in Vijayawada (both are
not Telugu ?)
"Dobbey" is a very bad word to use in Vijayawada. But it is used as
"toyyadamu" in Telangana and Rayalaseema. (Recollect..
"endukatla dobbutav... kanlu agupadta leva"... very common in Hyd
buses).
I remember listening to radio natakalu on Sunday afternoons (3.00 pm
those days). It's always had been a problem for me to understand (in full)
if it (the natakam) is relayed from Kadapa station (afcource... if it is
a real folk or native story). (I still remember asking everyone around me to
know what it means "pale gadu").
Basing on these facts and also with the fact that the people are moving in
all directions, I thought these differences would vanish (to a large extent)
and a common standard lang may errupt. As others also siting the movie, tv
media also may help for this. I may not be correct... but this is what I
meant !
Regards
Akki Raju
************************************************************************
C. Kambhampati
B. Akki Raju (b...@genius.tisl.soft.net) wrote:
<...lines deleted...>
: I am sorry... I am not a regular writer. May be I was not clear. I will
: try to explain what I meant by this. Always all the time spoken lang was
: understood by all the people throught AP. (I should have been more
: careful
: in writing this... I confess). What I meant was... some of the words
: (may be because of their origin) used in some of the regions are not very
: easy to understand for the people in the other regions.
: Ex : In Hyderabad you must have heard Auto walas complaining about
: "bonDalu" present on the road. (He means "gotulu") Say this in
: Vijayawada and see the reaction.
: "Nallla" in Hyd is not understood as "pampu" in Vijayawada (both are
: not Telugu ?)
: "Dobbey" is a very bad word to use in Vijayawada. But it is used as
: "toyyadamu" in Telangana and Rayalaseema. (Recollect..
: "endukatla dobbutav... kanlu agupadta leva"... very common in Hyd
: buses).
Dobbey is has the same meaning - in Hyd and Vijayawada. The
difference is is the usage. In Hyd it is used in the sense - why the
hell are you trying to get in and take my palce away from me....sort of
sliming your way into a long queue at the Cinema Ticket counter. It is
The problem is with redundancy - as is gaazu glass (unless ofcourse you
are using glass as in tumblers (for glass is really a material). Next is
the problem with bangaru gaazullu for there is a contradiction here(unless
in telugu gaazullu means bangles).
-chandrasekhar
V chowdary Jampala
shsk...@reading.ac.uk (C. Kambhampati) wrote:
>
>The problem is with redundancy - as is gaazu glass (unless ofcourse you
>are using glass as in tumblers (for glass is really a material). Next
is
In common Telugu usage, 'glass' refers to the tumbler, whereas in
English it refers to both the material as well as the tumbler. In Telugu,
gaazu refers to the material (glass), as well as a bangle.
>the problem with bangaru gaazullu for there is a contradiction
here(unless
>in telugu gaazullu means bangles).
Regards. ---- V. Chowdary Jampala