# Hindi/Urdu: Biharis



## lcfatima

What characterizes a person as having Bihari accent in Hindi or Urdu?


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## Faylasoof

The ones I've heard have a sing-song character to their speech!


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## BP.

Well, its somewhat of a _k-haRaa_ dialect, the vowel sounds are crisp and rather to the extremes of what they could be. For example, _me.n_ ('in') becomes _maa.n_, and _kaesaa _gets even more markedly dipthongised to _kaaiisaa_.

I feel its spoken from a bit forward in the buccal cavity than Lak-hnawii Urdu, which is rather low, glottal and very non-nasal. But they too say _ham_ for _mai.n_ like us!

Very interstingly too, gender reversal w.r.t standard Urdu sometimes occurs e.g. _ii gaaRii kahaa.n pa aaye gaa_ instead of _ye gaaRii kahaa.n pe/par aaye gii_.

Truth be told, you can't speak Behaarii unless you have a _paan kaa beeRaa_ in your mouth!

PS: Fat, I'll send you a link to Behaarii-speak by PM. Unfortunately forum rules don't allow videos embedded in posts.


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## BP.

Jack did you mean 'hum batlay rahen hain'?

That's the coolest thing I've heard all morning!


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## lcfatima

Okay thanks.


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## bakshink

Go to any Hindi News Channel and listen to video clips of Laaloo Parsad Yadav speaking or hear Nitish Kumar ( the present Chief Minister of Bihar) or Ram Vilas Paswan speak. In many Hindi movies Shool, Hazaron Khwaheshein Aisi and many others, the accent is beautifully captured.


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## Faylasoof

Laalooji is highly entertaining! And very endearing too!

I guess in my earlier reply I was too brief. I in fact recognise the main features of this dialect well. But it really does depend on the level of education of your Bihari speaker. There is the <rustic> accent, like that of the ever-likable Laalooji and there are those who you could mistake for even a Lakhnavi! The latter includes a branch of my family that seems to have retained the accent and speech of their Urduphone forefathers from UP.


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## BP.

Even though the accents are vastly different, the whole area was/is? for some reason logically bunched together, I've heard our elders refer to UP-Behaar ever so often together.


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## Qureshpor

BelligerentPacifist said:


> PS: Fat, I'll send you a link to Behaarii-speak by PM. Unfortunately forum rules don't allow videos embedded in posts.




In another thread (Urdu-Hindi: lena, karna etc. maculine forms) there has been a lot of talk about "Bihari". If you type "( Loose Talk) Behari Part1 on Youtube, you will find a very interesting comical piece. If you do find it entertaining, you can move onto part 2! There are also videos on the Hyderabadi, Delhi, Lakhnavi and othe accents. Cricket lovers will also find this series of some interest.


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## BP.

^Thank you, the Bihari accent is spot on in that series. But from what I could find, the Lakhnawi meme is missing. The Dilli one I found atrocious since it represented only the Baazaarii register, not the Teksaalii high Urdu of Dillii that is such a relish to the ears in my experience.


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## lcfatima

Why is it that Biharis mix up gender in Urdu? Doesn't Bihari and the Hindi-Urdu related dialects used in Bihar have gender?


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## tonyspeed

QURESHPOR said:


> "( Loose Talk) Behari Part1 on Youtube,



The similarity of this comedic piece and this forum at times had me laughing hysterically.



lcfatima said:


> Why is it that Biharis mix up gender in Urdu? Doesn't Bihari and the Hindi-Urdu related dialects used in Bihar have gender?




I think it was meant that for them certain objects have a different gender. The same occurs between Hindi and some forms of Urdu with certain words also.


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## lcfatima

Tonyspeed: The thing is, that doesn't seem to be the case in Bihari accent. I realize that different dialects of Hindi/Urdu also assign different gender to certain nouns (we have discussed dahi before) but with Biharis it seems as if, like Bengalis when they speak Hindi, they mix up gender a lot...Bengali doesn't have gender so there is the explanation, but what is the explanation for Biharis? Can it really be that gaRi is masculine in various dialects spoken in Bihari?

An example: several years ago I was speaking with my IL's head housekeeper. She is born and raised in Bihar and came to Karachi around 12 years ago (as an adult, she is in her late 40s). She is educated and not from a rural background, though I don't know if any specific dialect other than Urdu is spoken by her people at home (she says she is from Patna, she did not spend time in Bangladesh like many other Biharis in Karachi, but she may have roots in another part of Bihar and just say she comes from Patna to keep things simple). Her accent sounds fairly standard to me, except she says things like "sabzi accha hai." I noticed this and I thought perhaps she was imitating my manner of speaking back to me, since I do not always use the correct gender on nouns when I speak in Urdu, and as a non-native I have occasionally had people do this to me in other languages (more often in Arabic for some reason) and I asked my mother in law about it. She said, oh no, Bua is not making fun of you, this is how Biharis talk. I listened to her some more and I found that she seemed to say everything as if it were masculine...like BP's example about gaRi.


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## tonyspeed

lcfatima said:


> I found that she seemed to say everything as if it were masculine...like BP's example about gaRi.



This is just a speculation, but Bihari and Bengali do cross paths. Where does Bihari end and Bengali begin? I was watching a video once with rural people in the Bihar region or round about there and
the person used a word for animal I had never heard. Upon researching it, I realised that the word was used in Bengali. So depending on where she is from, I can see how the influence of Bengali
could be evident in her speech pattern. I believe this is the theory why Nepali (and Bengali) also virtually has no gender as well - it's usually what happens when a non-gender and a gender language mix. 

Of course this is pure speculation.


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## Qureshpor

tonyspeed said:


> This is just a speculation, but Bihari and Bengali do cross paths. Where does Bihari end and Bengali begin? I was watching a video once with rural people in the Bihar region or round about there and
> the person used a word for animal I had never heard. Upon researching it, I realised that the word was used in Bengali. So depending on where she is from, I can see how the influence of Bengali
> could be evident in her speech pattern. I believe this is the theory why Nepali (and Bengali) also virtually has no gender as well - it's usually what happens when a non-gender and a gender language mix.
> 
> Of course this is pure speculation.



So, if Icfatima is speculating and you are also speculating, have we got any further with the enquiry?


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## tonyspeed

QURESHPOR said:


> So, if Icfatima is speculating and you are also speculating, have we got any further with the enquiry?



Indeed, we have not.

In that case, please see this book: Gender across Languages by Bussmann. It explains the reason clearly. In certain areas use of standard gender agreement is seen as "over-educated" or "foreign", particularly among "uneducated female speakers". Javaab milaa!


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## tonyspeed

Also google a pdf called "A COMPARATIVE PHONOLOGICAL STUDY OF THE DIALECTS OF HINDI" Diwakar Mishraa & Kalika Bali. It has a nice description of the phonological differences of Bhojpuri.


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## ainch

To anyone still interested, Nepali does have gender but is reserved for living beings.

e.g.,
Sita walks = Sita hi(n)Dchhe (सीता हिँड्छे) - feminine
Ram walks = Ram hi(n)Dchha (राम हिँड्छ) - masculine

for vehicles, wind etc, it's always masculine
the wind blows = haawaa chalchha (हावा चल्छ) - masculine
the car goes forward = gaaDi agaaDi jaanchha (गाडी अगाडी जान्छ) - masculine


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