BHUBANESWAR: Eminent author Peggy Mohan on Friday enlightened the audience at Odisha Literary Festival-2024 on the nuances of English and how it has evolved by absorbing words from other languages.
Interacting with journalist Kaveree Bamzai during the session ‘English and Its Accents’, she said English, as it is spoken in India, is not incorrect. In fact, it has evolved as the speakers more often than not use their local languages while conveying a message.
“English in India has evolved from Prakrit (a group of vernacular Middle Indo-Aryan languages) and in the country, nouns are used profusely as compared to other nations. When people speak English in India, they do it very well,” said the author who has taught the language in universities like Harvard, JNU and Jamia Millia Islamia.
On whether English remains exclusive to the intellectuals, she said the language is no longer tough for poor who do not hesitate to speak it by confidently using some interesting words from their own language or dialect. Nevertheless, Indians have figured out who not to speak English with. The colonial past of the country makes it vital for people to learn English in order to succeed professionally.
On Hinglish, a mix of Hindi and English which has become popular in the last few years, Peggy cited the example of popular advertisement catchline of a soft drink ‘Dil Maange More’. The catchline, a mixture of Hindi and English, became immensely popular in the country especially among youngsters.
She further said Indian languages have evolved over the ages. All of these languages owe their origin to Sanskrit which also changed with introduction of sounds like ‘Ta’ and ‘Da’.
In what could be a revelation for many, the eminent author and academician pointed out that gender is not used in Odia. In fact, same is the case with Bengali and Bhojpuri.
Stating that English is often learnt by hearing others speak the language, she cited the example of her daughter who spoke Hindi till her initial years. But as everyone around her spoke in English, she picked up the language despite not being taught in school formally.
Peggy, with her simple yet effective examples, made it clear that there is no incorrect English. The language can just be spoken differently.
