12/08/09

dharma, artha, kama

and here's more evidence on why the indian nation is hindu:
I come from a family of film directors and writers and producers, and I was certain that I’d grown up watching movies with titles like the ones I’d used. So I phoned Ashish Rajadhakshya, editor of The Encyclopaedia of Indian Cinema, and asked him to put some queries to his database. He came back with some interesting numbers. It seems that to date, 31 feature films called "Dharma" have been made in India; if you allow for variations on the word (like "Dharma Yudh"), that number goes up to 84. Similarly, thirty movies called "Shakti" have been produced; it’s 54 if you allow variations. For "Shanti," the numbers are ten and eighteen. For "Kama," three and three. For "Artha," one and six.3 I suppose some overworked clerk at the Ministry of Permissible Language forgot to send out the right memo to the film industry.
i am sure there are more movies with 'khoon', 'pyar', 'chor' etc in their titles than those with 'dharma', shakti', 'kama' etc. but this other vikram chandra (the first, if you had missed my previous post, works in ndtv) also imagines india mostly in the hindu mould. it's not that indian cinema is less hindu, but its production requires more interaction with non-hindu elements than the production of an indian writer in english. he/she mostly had mostly gone to private schools where non-hindus were mostly absent, had lived in neighbourhoods where non-hindus were mostly tradesmen, hawkers, domestic help (or local cabbies, chaffeurs, road-labourers, maids, cooks, bakers, struggling actresses, security guards etc) - and anything resembling close interaction with them was usually frowned upon by elders in the family. he/she had mostly enjoyed a social life almost entirely peopled by hindus. and then had gone to university, where non-hindus were either totally absent or were made to make themselves invisible. and if he/she had gone abroad, to a foreign university, india would remain more emphatically hindu than if he/she had continued to live in india.

macaulay said:
The languages of western Europe civilised Russia. I cannot doubt that they will do for the Hindoo what they have done for the Tartar.
i don't know how any russian would react to that boast- but the hindoo continues to remain a hindoo, 174 years after macaulay delivered that prediction, and still retains an abiding interest in dharma, artha and kama.

[ why this series of posts on english? i don't know, but the subject seems important to me. the question of why a modern, democratic state classifies some engineers among all the engineers and technocrats it produces as better engineers and technocrats (alumni of iiti/ims), for instance- i haven't found any answers to those kind of questions either. both questions seem related, as psb too points out here].

22 comments:

SS said...

kuffir:

This (http://www.outlookindia.com/article.aspx?237015)is a far more chilling side of the "English debate." One that doesn't affect or concern the likes of Mukherjee and Chandra.

Shanta said...

Hmm so Hindus outwitted Macualay and survived the cultural genocide of the imperialists. So sad na

kuffir said...

ss,

thanks a lot for the link, and all your comments. still thinking of them.

SS said...

Not at all, I must do the thanking! Your blog is a good antidote to my strait-jacketed academic thinking.

gaddeswarup said...

Kuffir,
I actually liked "The Cult of Authenticity". It seemed to suggest that there are several Indias and is sort of advocating the right to write according to one's beckground. Having said that, in general, Indian English literature or blogs ( I have read very little of either; I have not read a single book of R.K. Narayan or Rusdie but read a few books of others. One story I liked was "Edmund Wilson in Benares" by Pankaj Mishra) do not seem to appeal to me much. It could be because I studied In Telugu until I left school and grew up in villages and Indian English literature seems to represent a different kind of India than I remember. But I am sure they also represent a section of the people and gives them a voice. I do not know how much influence they have ( I notice that academics want more grants and better salaries and have been getting them and some other blogs are bemoaning schemes like Negra.) on the politics of India but I assume that politicians are more representative of the people. As usual, tentative thoughts.

Kiran said...

The article by SS shows the diffuclty of North Indian students in mastering two languages both useful to them - Hindi and English.
But does anyone spare a thought on South Indians who apart from their mother tongue and English are forced with Hindi ?

gaddeswarup said...

I was in India until 1986 and worked in Bombay, Delhi, Shillong for over twenty years without learning Hindi (though I used to listen to a lot of Hindi songs and asked friends to explain the meanings of the songs that I liked). May be it depends on the job or the situation changed since then.

Kiran said...

Good for you Mr Gadde, But I dont think that is anywhere close to reality. Of course it is also possible to live in India for 40 years without experiencing casteism in certain jobs and situations as you mentioned.

Imposition of Hindi is a consequence of it being the official language of central government and the huge resources it commands. Millions of tax payers money is spent on popularizzing hindi and this led to the perception that hindi is the national language of India and others are being unpatriotic in not speaking it.

My personal observations are numerous - I studied in a national institure in deep south where even a villager from UP has more socializing oppurtunity than a well education South Indian. Cultural programmes meant 70-80% Hindi.

And there are many such things.

kuffir said...

swarup garu,

'It seemed to suggest that there are several Indias and is sort of advocating the right to write according to one's beckground.'

how can anyone disagree with that? i didn't even say i disliked the article- i am saying what's the point of the article? if it's to say that 'anyone can write according to his background'- why does he need to write an article about it?

there are two ways in which you can interpret his need to write the article- i)he has his own doubts about his 'authenticity' or ii) his background places him in a position, class-caste wise, which will always mean that he will speak for one tiny india over and against all others.

SS said...

kuffir:

Chandra's essay is a very compelling one. But it's worth asking why it's more compelling than the reality that stares all of us in the face: that English is for the vast majority an oppressive weapon keeping them from education and employment.
Or perhaps I should ask WHO is it more compelling for?

Language debates in India inevitably end up acknowledging that English is in a position of power today precisely because of our linguistic chauvinism, that we've accepted it because it puts all linguistic communities at an equal disadvantage. But has English created a level playing field? For me at least it's a very frustrating debate.

gaddeswarup said...

To SS above,
Rather vague thoughts below.
I have been reading Telugu blogs for a while though not systematically any particular blog. Most of those bloggers can write in English but chose to write in Telugu. I find it easier to write in English though I am not very comfortable; some things I find it easier to express in Telugu despite having spent all my professional life in English. I do not really know the reasons why they blog in Telugu. There could be some reasons of parochialism or patriotism but my guess is that they feel comfortable writing in Telugu with occasional uses of Samskrit (sometimes lot) and English words. It is possible that the language that one grows up with will not compltely go away easily. In any case, blogging seems to be helping in expressing more and technical and complex thoughts in a sort of everyday Telugu which seemed difficult(to me) a few years ago. Such ebbs and flowsmay be common in languages; Charles brown sais that the language at one stage really reached very low levels since it was discouraged by the rulers and that he ressurected it in a period of 30 years. Anyway, now people who have advantage of using English are deliberately using Telugu which is leading to usefulness in everyday usage of the language. It is possible that whatever the debates might say, there may be changes coming from some unknown considerations (desire? use?...) of the people.

Kiran said...

Adoption of English because it puts all other languages at equal disadvantage is a trivial reason. The more pressing reason is that vast amounts of science and other knowledge streams are readily available there. Should a poor country like India afford the linguistic chavunism of avoiding or slowing the access to knowledge.

There is no such pressing reason for hindi. Its imposition is chavunism

anu said...

>>The more pressing reason is that vast amounts of science and other knowledge streams are readily available there.

This appears compelling on the face of it, if one ignores the contribution of Japan, China and a number of European countries to S & T, who make information about science and tech available only through their native languages.

The Chinese have recently adapted to publishing in English journals, for a number of complex reasons and one them is not because they feel left out. On the other hand the Americans and Brits wring their hands at not being able to access their world class research info that they hold only in Chinese.

Indians using English, are accessing science and tech info from America and few other english speaking countries -substantial no doubt..... but I think this is also as much a trivial reason to hang on to English.

Kiran said...

@anu

China, japan are not India. And its not just s&T there is lot of economics and social related info in English. In UP, Bihar its largely one language policy at least in social sphere. Last time I checked no one is wringing their hands for social knowledge in Hindi.

BTW can you please give the profound reason which you think made india "hang on" to English ?

SS said...

Gaddeswarup:
I’m not quite sure how to respond to your comment. I don’t disagree with any of it, but I cannot comment on Telugu blogs because I don’t really read any. My reading in Telugu is entirely offline. :-) However, (and this is tangential, I know) I'm not sure if Indian blogs are representative of anything other than the views of an elite minority with access to education and technology. Perhaps it’s just some more voices than we’d hear from traditional media . . .Sure, language use and choices change, but are blogs the best indicators of this? True, there are people who deliberately choose to use Telugu. But in which domains?

And btw I don't think Telugu is in any danger of dying! It's the power equation I'm talking about. The language of business, science, technology, commerce, law, education is always the language of power any where in the world. I'm just surprised that in a country where significant numbers are (at least) bilingual so little importance is given to translation. Especially in domains of power. Thanks for sharing your thoughts. :-)

anu said...

Kiran, my comment was restricted to the part of S & T, clueless about social sciences... and yes modern science can be done without English...... if we were China/Japan or any country that didn't have colonial rule.

i cannot think of profound one, but the pedestrian one -a colonial hangover... what do you think?

gaddeswarup said...

SS,
I was vaguely thinking aloud and trying to feel my way around in a complex issue where I am not even able to formulate the problems properly. You said "It's the power equation I'm talking about. The language of business, science, technology, commerce, law, education is always the language of power any where in the world." I wonder how many from the poorer castes and tribes were in the power structure or had a voice before the arrival of English language in India and how many after.

Kiran said...

I dont understand why people here oppose English language .

Is it because of your love for your mother tongue ? then it is sentimental and no one can say anything

But if anyone is thinking usage of English denies anyone any oppurtunities then they are way off the mark

anu said...

Kiran, I am not opposing English, i just don't care for its inequal access to all Indians and the consequences of that. None of the reasons put forward justify or address THAT.

Anonymous said...

gaddeswarup:

>> I wonder how many from the poorer castes and tribes were in the power structure or had a voice before the arrival of English language in India and how many after.

Exactly. We all know that there is no significant change. Is even that insiginificant change attributable to English? We simply do not have enough data on the issue. I'm inclined to believe that English is yet another weapon hijacked by the elite, that it has created yet another elite caste. The solution is to make this weapon accessible to all. Given the existing power structure, is that even possible? Translation is another means. It is a huge untapped market ...

SS said...

Oops. That Anon is SS.

gaddeswarup said...

Another point that I have been thinking for a while is the following: With increasing interventions of the government and technology in everyday life (courts, lawyers, govt. applications, bills, cheques, gadgets etc), it has become necessary to use English words or equivalents in day to day use and to know some of the processes of how the goverment and offices function. How do the poor and uneducated handle this disadvantage?

 
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