KEEPING FAITH WITH THE MOTHER TONGUE
The Anxieties of a Local Culture
By Sugata Srinivasaraju
Pages: 288
Price: Rs. 200
Publisher: Navakarnataka Publications, Bangalore
This is a book of essays that explores the anxieties of a local language and its culture. The book’s point of reference is the Kannada language and Karnataka but it resonates the crisis being faced by hundreds of regional tongues and cultures across the globe. The book presumes that the diffidence, desperation and a sense of defeat in the speakers of non-English tongues are similar to that of the speakers of the Kannada language.
The book does not confine itself to literature to make its point on the crisis, but also probes the different dimensions of the conflict – economic, political, moral and aesthetic. Therefore, in the book, anxiety about the clipped and compromised existence of the Kannada language is spoken of in the same breath as the death of a river or the effort of corporate houses to grab land. The aspect of identity forms a backdrop to the entire book and it is argued that identity is conceived on the tripod of land, water and language. Hence, losing them in whatever measure tantamounts to losing identity.
The book also deals with the issue of cosmopolitanism versus chauvinism. An issue that has disturbed our peace in the recent past. In the everyday sense, cosmopolitanism is largely associated with the use of English language and the ‘benign’ global environments it is said to ‘naturally’ create. This is often contrasted with the milieu generated by local languages and cultures, which are hastily and unfairly dubbed as ‘provincial’ and ‘parochial.’ Ordinarily, all celebrations of cosmopolitanism are about shedding the cultural self and specifics and merging oneself with an amorphous techno-global identity. The book challenges this view. There are a total of 46 essays in the book under five different sections.
