Politics of Language and Identity
As language debates about the imposition of Hindi rage in Karnataka, we look into the EPW Archives to shed light on the politics of language in India.
As language debates about the imposition of Hindi rage in Karnataka, we look into the EPW Archives to shed light on the politics of language in India.
- Hany Babu M T’s special article (2017) discusses how the Constitution only pays lip service to the linguistic plurality of India and has created a hierarchy of languages—with Sanskrit, Hindi, and the scheduled and the non-scheduled languages occupying various rungs of the ladder.
- Vasudha Dalmia’s review (2003) of Alok Rai’s “Hindi Nationalism,” addresses complex issues like: "What was/is Hindi?" and "Where/when was Hindi?"
- Janaki Nair’s article (1996) examines Kannada nationalism on the basis that it, like all nationalisms, attempts to produce a solidarity between all Kannada speakers in order to efface the specificities of caste and class.
- Kumool Abbi (2013) complicates the understanding of Hindi as a hegemonic language, studying the subversion of Hindi language in the cow-belt through the medium of cinema, particularly popular Bhojpuri cinema, which is also linked to the processes of internal migration and formation of identity.
- C S Venkiteswaran (2015) discusses how the nationalisation of tele-serials via dubbed big-budget Hindi productions leads to the muting of the local narratives in Indian television.
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