Unique Word, Common Problem

By Supriya Savkoor

Every now and then, I learn a new word that I wonder how I couldn’t have known before. The one I learned most recently was completely new to me, despite it describing a common phenomenon in a great many modern cultures.

In fact, the word irredentism itself is fairly modern. It comes from the Italian word irrendentismo, meaning “unredeemed,” and originally refers to a popular movement to unify all Italian-speaking people within a national identity. The movement unofficially began when France annexed the then-Italian island of Corsica in 1768, followed soon after by Napoleon’s annexation of Tuscany, Piedmont, and Liguria. The Kingdom of Italy considered any community in which Italians, or a majority of a population speaking Italian, a part of this “unredeemed Italy,” and made it its mission to unify Italians, a movement that took off in the late 19^th and early 20^th centuries.

The term came into use in 1866, when the Kingdom of Italy fought its third war of independence against the Austrian Empire and won back Venezia (Venice). Three years later, it achieved the milestone win of Rome itself, where the papacy had reigned supreme for more than a thousand years.

Irredentism was the main reason Italy entered World War I, after which it reclaimed several more important territories, including Trieste and Istria. Fascist Italy in World War II began annexing even areas in which Italians were only a minority, and after the war, the movement slowed down altogether.

By then, the idea of nationalism was catching on big elsewhere, with unification movements springing up across Europe along linguistic, cultural, and ethnic lines. Nationalist movements and ethnic uprisings began challenging and ultimately breaking up the powers of the Austro-Hungarian, Russian, and Ottoman empires, leading to the independence of many “majority” linguistic groups we now know as Greece, Serbia, Moldova, Bulgaria, Poland, Croatia, Serbia, Romania, Slovakia, Ukrainia, the Czech Republic, Slovenia, Cyprus, Egypt, Sudan, Armenia, Libya, Syria, Israel, Lebanon, and Turkey. These cultures formed national identities around their native tongue, including historic, folkloric, and literary traditions, and ultimately, around their common political aspirations.

Irrendentism plays a role in much of the world’s modern political challenges. When colonial powers redrew borders in Africa, Asia, and the Middle East, many of the resultant states were unhappy by the artificially imposed national borders, conflicting historical claims, and ethnic groups splitting up between countries (such as the Pashtuns between Afghanistan and Pakistan and the Yorubas between Nigeria and Benin).

An area claimed by more than one group is also considered irredentism, and no surprise, you’re already familiar with a bunch of them. China’s claim over Taiwan. The “tug of war” between Israel and the Palestinian National Authority over the West Bank and Gaza. India and Pakistan’s equal claims (and multiple wars) over Kashmir. Argentina’s longstanding claim over the Falkland Islands. The 2008 claim of independence by Kosovo. Greece’s claim over the name “Macedonia.” The now-resolved issue of Northern Ireland between the UK and Ireland.

The word appears in lots of white papers and policy briefs, along with such words as “nationalism” or even “revisionism.” And, of course, in the media. Surely now, you’ll see it more often, as I have. Such a big part of our world today, yet now that I know the precise word for it, it feels sadder somehow, perhaps a kind of proof that we’re trending toward splintering off rather than coming together?

Who knows. But as you contemplate my "new word" discovery, any words that surprised you or made you view the world a little differently? Do share.

No, Really, Who Am I?

Someone recently asked whether my family is north or south Indian, and the question gave me serious pause. I know, it should be a fairly straightforward question for anyone to answer, yet I’m embarrassed to admit that I couldn’t do it. Even after a bit of research, I’m still not quite certain. Yes, I see you shaking your head and muttering “no way.” And yet…

Part of the problem is that both my parents are from Bombay, born and raised. Bombay – or Mumbai, as it's now called – is a little like New York. Once you move there, it’s hard to remember anywhere you’d been before. (That dig is specifically directed at my New York friends, who’ve fallen off the map, so to speak.)

And yes, at least a couple of my grandparents and possibly most of my great grandparents were born in the south Indian state of Karnataka. Some of my ancestors even took their surnames from the tiny villages in Karnataka where they lived. That makes us south Indian, right? Maybe.

The distribution of Konkani speakers along India's
southwestern coast. (Photo by ImperiumCaelestis)

The predominant language spoken in Karnataka today is Kannada, a Dravidic language like the other main south Indian languages such as Telugu, Malayalam, and Tamil. Dravidians belong to one of two major civilizations that have their roots in ancient India, the Aryans being the other and from which north Indians and Pakistanis have descended. Scholars believe the Indian subcontinent was entirely Dravidian until the Aryans migrated south from Central Asia and possibly the Caucasus (southern Russia).

The two traditions are as different as night and day. The languages are completely different, though today, they reflect slight influences on one another. The Dravidic languages have curly alphabets that look and sound different from north Indian languages, which use the more linear devnagri script. Aryans are typically fairer, Dravidians darker. The two have different accents, and many would say, very different cultures, even histories. Though India is probably one of the most successful melting pots you'll find, as with any large, diverse culture, biases and discrimination exist between these groups. Not as a rule, just on occasion.

Perhaps I’m just reluctant to choose sides, you’re wondering? It’s more complicated. My family speaks Konkani, which happens to sound a lot like Marathi, the main language spoken in Maharashtra, of which Mumbai is the capital. Konkani also shares a lot of etymology from Hindi, a north Indian language. Without much effort, I can understand a good bit of both languages (though more Marathi than Hindi), whereas I cannot understand a word of South Indian languages. I've heard quite a bit of Kannada spoken around my in-laws’ home in Bangalore but still can't understand more than a handful of words. (They, too, are Konkani, yet my father in-law can’t speak a word of it. Or maybe won’t.)

A NASA satellite image shows the location of
the ancient Saraswati River, which has since dried up.

It’s also been established that the Konkani-speaking community from which I hail, known as the Saraswats, descended from one of the five Hindu Brahmin communities that once lived on the banks of the ancient Saraswati River. Many subcommunities hail from these original Saraswats, including the Kashmiri Saraswat Brahmins, of which former prime minister Indira Gandhi was a notable member. In fact, many people from her community use the surnames of “bhat” or “pandit,” meaning priest and religious scholar. Gandhi’s father, Jawaharlal Nehru, whom I wrote about last week, was widely called Panditji, the “ji” added as a term of honor. Many Konkani-speaking Saraswats from Karnataka are descended from pandits as well, from even just a few generations back, before their own kids started moving away to study, work, and eventually take up other occupations in big cities and abroad.

Last month, after being asked about my northern vs. southern roots and stumbling over my response, I did a little research. That is, I turned to Wikipedia, where I learned that my community likely did descend from the original Kashmiri pandits – though not conclusively. (Damn you, Wiki!)

I’d been hearing bits and pieces of this theory for years, even had an American college professor who wrote a book on the topic, so it was interesting to gather more details. Beginning in the early 13^th century, forced conversion to Islam had begun in Kashmir, driven in large part by a Mughal general from Turkmenistan. Between 1389 and 1413, religious persecution of Hindus was at its peak under a sultan who at the time ruled Kashmir, leading many Saraswats to head southwest to Goa (just a bit north of Karnataka), drawn there because of the fertile land along the Arabian Sea and the religious tolerance under its local (Dravidian) kingdoms. 

On their way south, the Saraswats passed through Gujarat, which may explain why Konkani-speaking Saraswats share some vocabulary with Gujarati, words even Marathi and Hindi, with their closer linguistic association to Gujarati, don’t use. (Hard to otherwise explain this fact.)

Cover page of the 1622 book,
Doutrina Christam em Lingoa
Bramana Canarim ("Christian
Doctrines in the Canarese Brahmin
Language"), by Fr. Thomas Stephens,
a Jesuit missionary priest in Goa

Before the Saraswats arrived in Goa, the local form of Konkani had already been influenced by other cultures, for example, by ancient Sumerians who had settled there. Goa had long been a major trade center with the Arabs and Persians as well, so many Arab and Persian words infiltrated into Konkani – such as dhukan for “shop,” fakt for “only,” and karz for “debt.” A few centuries after the Saraswats arrived and adopted Konkani as their new language, Portuguese traders followed by Christian missionaries landed in Goa. From the 16th century until the early 19th century, the Goa Inquisition resulted in many forced conversions, this time to Christianity. To avoid persecution and/or losing their land, a great number of Saraswats converted to Catholicism and even today are known as “Brahmin Catholics.” Goa still retains this largely Christian, Portuguese-influenced Konkani culture and language.

Meanwhile, a smaller group of Saraswats moved farther south, into the small villages and towns of Karnataka. Some moved farther still, into Kerala. In both Karnataka and Kerala, they were able to practice their religion, build temples, buy land, and hold government jobs. Today along this coastal stretch, you’ll find not just Saraswats, but Konkanis of all religions and dialects, too numerous to count. Konkani Muslims in Karnataka, for example, are descended from the intermarriage between the locals and Arab seafarers as well as through conversions. The sailor-warriors from Ethiopia, known as Siddhis, also adopted the language and planted roots in the area. (Yes, there are black people in India. And they weren't slaves.)

When Bombay became a boom town in the early 19^th century, a great many Konkani-speaking Saraswats – no doubt, drawing from their adventurous, nomadic roots – migrated there, so much so, that many families, such as mine, lost most of their connection with the south, while others, such as my husband’s family, retained it. Though exact numbers are hard to come by, it’s possible that today as many Konkani-speaking Saraswats live outside of India as within it.

A few parts of this history still aren't clear: how and why did we pick up the Konkani language? It appears that Konkani existed in the south long before the Saraswats’ exodus from Kashmir. The earliest-known proof of its existence dates to about the 2^nd century A.D., and Konkani was already spoken on the Konkan Coast, from Goa to Kerala. But that fact only raises more questions – if Konkani was already spoken in that part of the world, what did the Saraswats speak before they moved there? And if we adopted a language that already existed in the area, could we also have been absorbed into its culture through the mixing of bloodlines? Maybe we have both north and south Indian blood? 

And why did the Saraswars adopt Konkani, of all things, and not one of the more widely spoken (read: more useful) majority languages, one with a real script?

A map adapted from A Historical Atlas of South
Asia, Oxford University Press (1992), lists Konkani
as an Indo-Aryan language. (Image by BishkekRock)

The origin of the Konkani language is a puzzle anthropologists are still figuring out as well. It appears to be an Indo-Aryan language, related more to Sanskrit than to the Dravidic languages of the south. One article I found says these Saraswats spoke Sanskrit in public and invented a simplified version, Brahmani, that they spoke at home. Brahmani may have formed a sort of grassroots version of Konkani. A study by the Indian Anthropological Society found that some Konkani speakers (not the Saraswats) are descended from Australoid tribes that came to India from the Mediterranean in pre-historic times, spoke early Dravidian languages, and migrated to north India! (Then moved back with the Saraswats? If so, no kidding about our nomadic spirit. No wonder I'm so antsy.) 

Even the origin of the word “Konkani” is disputed. It sounds a bit like the word Kannada, but it could also have been derived from the Persian (Aryan) word kinara, meaning “the language of the coast." The anthropologists who conducted the study conclude it could just be a language born of the confluence of Indo-Aryan dialects that absorbed some Dravidic characteristics. Either way, Konkani has the structure and syntax of an Aryan language and the grammar of a Dravidic one. 

All that to say that the Saraswats who left Kashmir for Karnataka probably took along their own dialect (possibly Brahmani), borrowed some useful Gujarati words along the way, and melded it all with a Dravidic form of Konkani, which in turn borrowed from the Persian and Arabic. Sounds like a real stretch, but if it's true, it's a pretty astounding amalgamation of cultures and languages.

Either way, I’ll just have to change the subject next time someone asks me that question, don't you think?

The Traveling Word – Denglish, Yenglish, and Linguistic Globetrotters

Public Viewing in Berlin
Photo by Thalan

I love it when words go a-travelin’. I picture them walking down the syntactical breezeway on their spindly, alphabetical legs, clad in a Hawaiian shirt, a Stetson on their vowelly heads. And like some global travelers, the first thing that happens to these linguistic tourists is they immerse themselves in the local culture and gain an experience that changes them forever.

When the globetrotting word or phrase is English (or American or Australian, for that matter) and the language receiving it German, the cultural merger is known as Denglish – a melding of “Deutsch” (German) and “English.” These words have been absorbed from English into German, sometimes undergoing a semantic shift along the way so that they no longer mean exactly the same thing they did in the original language.

Here are a few of my favorites:

A Handy (pronounced “hendy”) is what German speakers call a cell phone. This word has been around so long, it isn’t really Denglish anymore but a regular German expression. And while cell phones are certainly “handy” (some would say “indispensable”), the term is based on the human appendage and not on the device’s convenience. “Handy,” in its German usage, may have been derived from Motorola’s Handie-Talkie AM SCR536, a handheld radio transceiver American troops used in World War II.

A public viewing, in American English at least, has me picturing funerals and corpses, especially when the deceased is famous. Michael Jackson had a public viewing when he died, as did Teddy Kennedy. But in Germany, you’re likely to find a Public Viewing at a soccer game. There, it refers to the live broadcasting of sports matches, concerts, or other major events on oversized video screens set up in public areas such as city squares, shopping malls, or bars.

The German term was coined in 2006 during preparations for the World Cup Soccer Championships. FIFA, the International Federation of Association Football, introduced Fan Fest events, where they broadcast the matches on video screens in major cities around Germany. The reason, ostensibly, was because they’d miscalculated the number of fans attending the World Cup and didn’t have enough tickets to sell.

Interestingly, the Denglish version of “public viewing” has migrated back into English usage, at least in the media, where it is now applied to sports broadcasts. But for me, the expression will always have to do with a state funeral.

Here’s another of my favorite Denglish words: If a German speaker were to ask me to turn on the Beamer, she wouldn’t be suggesting I get into the luxury car sitting in my garage (I wish!) and warm up the engine. In German, a Beamer is not a BMW but a video projector. The term is derived from the English verb “to beam” or shine a light, which is precisely what a projector does.

Denglish also works in the opposite direction. Take the über-use of über. In American English these days, the expression is a prefix meaning “the most,” “the best,” or “the ultimate.” We have über-achievers (especially here in Silicon Valley), who are a step up from overachievers. The chocolate fudge cake you ate for dessert was probably über-yummy, and if you have a teenage girl in your family, chances are you’ve heard her refer to her brother as an “über-dork.”

The German original has the connotation of exaggeration as well – as in übertreiben (to exaggerate). But über in German can mean “across,” as in übersetzen (to translate – literally to transport words across linguistic boundaries). And it can stand on its own; über means “over” or “via” or “above.” Note that Germans always write über with an umlaut (the two dots over the u), while the term is becoming so well integrated into English that it’s often written without the dots.

Then we have the English word, “mensch” – a decent person. Jimmy Stewart in It’s A Wonderful Life is a mensch – a regular, stand-up guy. Rhett Butler from Gone With The Wind is not. Except in German he is, because Mensch in that language means, simply, a human being, male or female, neither good, bad, nor devious. In English, though, mensch isn’t really Denglish. It’s Yenglish, because English borrowed the word from Yiddish (which, in turn, got it from German). This globetrotter has a lot of stamps in its passport.

What are some of your favorite traveling words? Any Denglish, Yenglish, Spanglish, or Franglais in your vocabulary?

How Many Syllables Are in That Word?

When most Americans see Arabic script, the first thing that comes to mind is Islam, the Koran and perhaps those blue and gold postage stamps commemorating the holy month of Ramadan.

I, on the other hand, think of a former linguistics professor who once gave our class an unusual exercise. She put a big sheet of Arabic writing on the wall and asked us to describe what we saw. The lines reminded me of a time when, as a small child not yet able to read, I used to draw pictures and scribble squiggly lines underneath, my first crude attempts at writing a story. The Arabic looked a lot like those scribbles. Only prettier.

No matter how hard I squinted at the script on the classroom wall, I couldn’t tell where one word ended and the next began. There were dots everywhere, but nothing that resembled punctuation. For the first time in decades, I felt illiterate.

Fifteen years later, my Iranian husband’s parents came to live with us, and in a few months I had acquired rudimentary Farsi conversation skills. But the language uses the Arabic script so I still couldn’t read or write a single word. Unacceptable.

My husband patiently wrote out the Farsi version of the Arabic alphabet for me, all thirty-two letters (four more than in Arabic), then showed me how to form them. I tackled the problem much the way I’d learned to write the Latin alphabet, taking each letter in order and practicing its various forms. I had vague memories of first grade and lines of letters marching across the page: Aa, Bb, Cc and on to Zz. So I tried creating similar lines of آ to ى.

Unfortunately, the Arabic script doesn’t work like the Latin one. For one thing, it’s written in cursive style from right to left, except for the numbers which go from left to right. Then there are four forms to most letters, not just two, depending on where they occur in a word: beginning, middle, end or sitting all lonesome on their own. And here’s the clincher: even after breaking the words down into individual letters, the script still looks like bewildering squiggles, each symbol distinguished from its sisters only by the number and placement of the associated dots.

So is jim (prounounced like the man’s name) the one with the dot in the middle of the loop (ج) or above the letter (خ)? Is the ت with two dots above the line pronounced like a T, or is that the one with a single dot below the line? Nope, ب sounds like a B.

I was nearly at my wit’s end, figuring I’d never learn to read Farsi, when a cousin in Iran came to the rescue. She sent me a set of first-grade primers with pictures. Bingo! Turns out, Iranian kids don’t learn their letters by memorizing the alphabet from alef to ye. Instead the letters are presented in sets, so you learn these together: ب ت ث, and then these: ح ج خ . So much easier to remember where the dots are supposed to go this way.

I know the Arabic script now, but that doesn’t mean I can read the language with ease. That’s because Farsi has one more bewildering quirk: you don’t write the vowels! Vowel symbols do exist, but no literate person would be caught dead using them in written form.

So how do you sound out an unfamiliar word? Simple answer: you don’t. When all I’ve got are two or three consonants to work with, I can’t even tell how many syllables the word contains.

Over time, I’ve gotten a better feel for Farsi and its linguistic patterns, which makes reading easier as well. Sometimes I can even correctly guess those unfamiliar words. One thing is certain: practice makes perfect, and the more Farsi I read, the easier it becomes.