# Hindi: Appropriate language for sci-fi setting?



## souminwé

I'm trying to brainstorm some ideas for a cyberpunk / sci-fi short story in Hindi, and I've run into a problem with the level of Sanskritisation or Persianised / "Urdu-ised" vocabulary. The majority of the story and dialogue, I intend to write in a regular-yet-slightly-Urdu-ised register. However, the occasional "access denied, does not compute"-type sentences, I'd like to translate by keeping the futuristic flavour without too many English loans.

In English, the Greek/Latin phrases are increased to create the futuristic atmosphere. 

In Hindi, however, I'm not sure if I should use Sanskritised Hindi vocabulary, or lean towards toned down Urdu? To me Urdu-ised vocabulary sounds more fashionable and sexy, and hence more appropriate for a sci-fi type story. But, I'm assuming Sanskritised Hindi would sound more "scientific" to someone educated in India, and more appropriate?


Here are some examples I thought up on the spot. Which one do you see an android soldier saying into the communication chip installed in her brain (lol): 

_lakshya sampuurn_ vs. _manzil takmiil/tamaam_

_aadesh sviikrit_ vs. _farmaan manzuur_

_ishT nishkaasan asviikrit _vs. _matluub barkhastagi namanzuur_ 


The SanskritnishTh version sounds weird to me...

Thanks for any input!


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## Qureshpor

souminwé said:


> I'm trying to brainstorm some ideas for a cyberpunk / sci-fi short story in Hindi, and I've run into a problem with the level of Sanskritisation or Persianised / "Urdu-ised" vocabulary. The majority of the story and dialogue, I intend to write in a regular-yet-slightly-Urdu-ised register. However, the occasional "access denied, does not compute"-type sentences, I'd like to translate by keeping the futuristic flavour without too many English loans.
> 
> In English, the Greek/Latin phrases are increased to create the futuristic atmosphere.
> 
> In Hindi, however, I'm not sure if I should use Sanskritised Hindi vocabulary, or lean towards toned down Urdu? To me Urdu-ised vocabulary sounds more fashionable and sexy, and hence more appropriate for a sci-fi type story. But, I'm assuming Sanskritised Hindi would sound more "scientific" to someone educated in India, and more appropriate?
> 
> 
> Here are some examples I thought up on the spot. Which one do you see an android soldier saying into the communication chip installed in her brain (lol):
> 
> _lakshya sampuurn_ vs. _manzil takmiil/tamaam_
> 
> _aadesh sviikrit_ vs. _farmaan manzuur_
> 
> _ishT nishkaasan asviikrit _vs. _matluub barkhastagi namanzuur_
> 
> 
> The SanskritnishTh version sounds weird to me...
> 
> Thanks for any input!



*Firstly, let me be totally frank with you. I don't know any Sanskrit. So, the Sanskritised dialogue that you have come up might as well be a language spoken by aliens! In one sense this is good because the concept of "aliens" is futuristic, is n't it? But if you wish a possibly greater readership (taking into account the Bollywood film language) who would understand your dialogue, then the Urdu forms seem more appropriate to me. I don't know about you, but the Hindi forms sounded more like German to my ears! Nothing against German or Hindi of course!

I think your first one is for " Mission accomplished" and the last one " Request for dismissal denied". Is this so? If yes, then I would go for:

muhim sar-anjaam!
dar-Khvaast-i-barKhvaast naa-manzuur (Do you like the rhyming effect?)

If any of your (and my) suggestions are slightly out of phase with the correct grammar, then this too might point to the future. Already people don't seem to care much for this, why would an Android be too bothered?



*


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## xjm

To me Sanskritized vocabulary sounds the opposite of futuristic--it sounds religious, classical.  I'm not a native speaker, so don't read too much into my opinion.    But personally I'd go for the Urdu-ish variants, despite that technical fields sometimes use Sanskritized vocabulary to avoid English loanwords.  (My field just uses the English loanwords most of the time.)


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## souminwé

QURESHPOR said:


> * I don't know about you, but the Hindi forms sounded more like German to my ears! Nothing against German or Hindi of course!
> 
> I think your first one is for " Mission accomplished" and the last one " Request for dismissal denied". Is this so? If yes, then I would go for:
> 
> muhim sar-anjaam!
> dar-Khvaast-i-barKhvaast naa-manzuur (Do you like the rhyming effect?)
> 
> If any of your (and my) suggestions are slightly out of phase with the correct grammar, then this too might point to the future. Already people don't seem to care much for this, why would an Android be too bothered?
> 
> *



I agree! I find the Sanskritised version foreign, hard to say - and frankly kind of ugly!

And those are great translations! I just thought up word-by-word translations for the English phrases on the spot, but yours are much more creative. A warning to me that I'll have to try harder!
(and yes the rhyming is wonderful!)



> To me Sanskritized vocabulary sounds the opposite of futuristic--it sounds religious, classical. I'm not a native speaker, so don't read too much into my opinion.   But personally I'd go for the Urdu-ish variants, despite that technical fields sometimes use Sanskritized vocabulary to avoid English loanwords. (My field just uses the English loanwords most of the time.)



I had a suspicion it sounded religious. I haven't been educated in formal Hindi at all, so I wasn't sure how it was perceived by people who may actually read Hindi newspapers (which I don't do without a good dictionary, generally).


Thank you guys for the suggestions, this will really change my writing


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## greatbear

It all depends on what is your target audience. While your Sanskrit-based vocab is at least understood, though not very used now, your Urdu-based vocab is completely incomprehensible to me (and would be to numerous other Indians, especially to those outside the Urdu belt).
By the way, why are you not using a literary register of Hindi?

It's also a matter of what would sound more beautiful to your audience's ears. To me, Sanskrit sounds more beautiful. And of course, I don't see any "religious" sounds to it!


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## tonyspeed

In my opinion, scientific terms are not supposed to be beautiful. I believe the use of the Urdu would be more suited for poetic contexts. Many Indians get their scientific education in English; therefore, English would be more appropriate and more readily understandable to those with a typical high-school education. If English is to be avoided, then the Sanskritized terms would be more suitable for technology. Even if the audience doesn't understand the word, at least it sounds long and complex, which is in my opinion what alien technology should sound like.

Many Pakistani-origin Urdu speakers are somewhat anti-Sanskrit because they have no exposure to it. So it sounds like Greek to them. Keep that in mind when deciphering the previous comments.


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## Istriano

Bollywood SF movies feature the normal Bollywood Urduized Hindi.
Enthiran (Robot) was a Tamil SF movie, and it was not dubbed into overly formal Sanskritized Hindi, but into a regular Bollywood Hindi, with frequent English loans.


If you want to create a more technical/formal atmosphere, feel free to use English terms. 

It's funny a book is said _kitab _in Bollywood Hindi, while it's _pustakam_ (from Sanskrit) in Tamil and Malayalam. 
Colloquial everyday Malayalam has more Sanskrit words than colloquial everyday Hindi. 

It's also funny that as Hindi is being deUrduized (introducing Sanskrit neologisms or older forms), Tamil is being deSanskritized (introducing Dravidian neologisms or older forms).
Maybe we should all go back to Vedic Sanskrit.


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## tonyspeed

Istriano said:


> It's funny a book is said _kitab _in Bollywood Hindi, while it's _pustakam_ (from Sanskrit) in Tamil and Malayalam.
> Colloquial everyday Malayalam has more Sanskrit words than colloquial everyday Hindi.



While somewhat off subject: this is because the Sanskritisation of the Dravidian languages predates the (re-)Sanskritisation of Khari Boli which only began full-force in the 1800s and was never accepted fully in colloquial contexts...

In colloquial Hindi, Sanskrit terms sometimes carry additional, stronger connotations. For example nafrat is hate. Whereas, ghrina is extreme hatred or repulsion. Kitab is a book,  whereas pustak can carry the meaning of a holy book.


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## Istriano

Yes, I've noticed this...from _ishq _(erotic love) to _pyaar _(general love) to _prem _(spiritual love).


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## BP.

Istriano said:


> ...from _ishq _(erotic love)...


Good. Now we can tear up and throw away kulliyaat ee iqbal. Nobody told the poor soul the word meant this, he has ended up using it all wrong.


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## Qureshpor

tonyspeed said:


> While somewhat off subject: this is because the Sanskritisation of the Dravidian languages predates the (re-)Sanskritisation of Khari Boli which only began full-force in the 1800s and was never accepted fully in colloquial contexts...
> 
> In colloquial Hindi, Sanskrit terms sometimes carry additional, stronger connotations. For example nafrat is hate. Whereas, ghrina is extreme hatred or repulsion. Kitab is a book,  whereas pustak can carry the meaning of a holy book.



*Regarding "kitaab", Chapter 2 Verse 2 of the Qur'an.

"This is the book (al-kitaab) wherein there is no doubt; a guidance for the God-conscious".

"nafrat" can be much more than "hate". It could be "revulsion" or "abomination"!
*


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## xjm

Istriano said:


> Yes, I've noticed this...from _ishq _(erotic love) to _pyaar _(general love) to _prem _(spiritual love).



Yes, I have always found that particular trio fascinating.  There's definitely a lot of sociolinguistic dimensions in way the the lexicon has evolved--is still evolving!--across the Hindi-Urdu continuum.  (You can actually see some of this in English as well--we have "beef" from Old French for table food, but "cow" from the Germanic root for the animal out in the barn.)



BelligerentPacifist said:


> Good. Now we can tear up and throw away kulliyaat ee iqbal. Nobody told the poor soul the word meant this, he has ended up using it all wrong.



Well, maybe "obsessive love" would be a better translation--that covers both the spiritual and secular connotations.



Istriano said:


> It's funny a book is said _kitab _in Bollywood Hindi, while it's _pustakam_ (from Sanskrit) in Tamil and Malayalam.
> Colloquial everyday Malayalam has more Sanskrit words than colloquial everyday Hindi.
> 
> It's also funny that as Hindi is being deUrduized (introducing Sanskrit neologisms or older forms), Tamil is being deSanskritized (introducing Dravidian neologisms or older forms).



That is interesting as well!


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## Qureshpor

Istriano said:


> Yes, I've noticed this...from _ishq _(erotic love) to _pyaar _(general love) to _prem _(spiritual love).



*I would disagree with your "compartmentalisation" of 'ishq, prem and pyaar. 'ishq is certainly not "erotic" love and neither is prem "spritual" love per se. In the right context they could provide all the meanings. *


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## tonyspeed

Istriano said:


> from _ishq _(erotic love)



In India, ishq is atually filmi love.


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## Faylasoof

Although I tend to agree with rebuttals of the arbitrarily (even rather naively) restrictive meanings and usages conferred upon words such as _3ishq_, _kitaab_ etc., _let us stick to the topic!_ This happens to be:

*Appropriate language for sci-fi setting*

Perhaps adopting Vedic Sanskrit (with subtitles in appropriate modern languages) as the lingo for Bollywood sci-fi movies is not such a bad idea given that the _reconstructed_ Proto-Indo-European – a still more ancient and yet more alien sounding thus highly recommended language for this genre - has much catching up to do. Vedic Sanskrit would give us the right feeling of going back to the future!


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## Qureshpor

greatbear said:


> It all depends on what is your target audience. While your Sanskrit-based vocab is at least understood, though not very used now, your Urdu-based vocab is completely incomprehensible to me (and would be to numerous other Indians, especially to those outside the Urdu belt).
> By the way, why are you not using a literary register of Hindi?



*I was under the  impression, obviously wrongly, that most Indians understood Bollywood's  so called "Hindi" films. If they don't, then why are they bothering to  go to the cinemas in the first place? And if they do, then I am sure  they will understand the "Urdu-based" vocabulary used in the initial  post. Let us just take a look at the vocabulary used by Souminwe.

manzil

gaataa rahe meraa dil 
tuu hii merii manzil
(film- Guide)

tamaam

chhalkaa'e jaam...
aap hii kaa naam le kar pii hai sabhii ne
aap par dhaRak rahe haiN payaaloN ke siine
yahaaN ajnabii ko'ii nahiiN
yih hai aap kii maHfil tamaam
**chhalkaa'e jaam..

(Film: Mere ham-dam mere dost)

manzuur

tum aaheN bharo aur shikve karo
yih baat hameN manzuur nahiiN
tum taare gino aur niiNd uRe
vuh raat hameN manzuur nahiiN

(Film: Aaii milan kii belaa)
**
**naa-manzuur**(common sense should prevail!)*
*
farmaan In many a film you will have come across this word to mean "command/order". If not, you must have come across "farmaa'iye"!

matluub In film "police/court" scenes you will have heard  this word for "wanted".

barKhaastagii A sentence similar to "aaj kii sunaa'ii barKhaast hotii hai"would be heard in a court setting. "Today's hearing is adjourned". Or, " is police afsar ko is ke 'uhde se barKhaast kiyaa jaataa hai!". "This police officer is dismissed from his rank!".

takmiil/anjaam

You will no doubt know of Sahir Ludhianavi's song from the film"Gumrah", "chalo ik baar phir se.." Sahir originally wrote..

vuh afsaanah jise takmiil tak laanaa nah ho mushkil
use ik Khuubsuurat moR de ke chhoRnaa achchhaa

For the film, this was changed to..

**vuh afsaanah jise anjaam tak laanaa nah ho mushkil
use ik Khuubsuurat moR de ke chhoRnaa achchhaa*

*Now, perhaps you could enlighten us with the equivalent Sanskrit words used by** Souminwe, in "Hindi" film songs. Where is the Urdu belt, by the way?**
*


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## Qureshpor

tonyspeed said:


> In my opinion, scientific terms are not supposed to be beautiful. I believe the use of the Urdu would be more suited for poetic contexts.
> 
> *Are you suggesting that Urdu is only suitable for "poetic contexts" and nothing beyond that? Is there no literature in it for social sciences, mathematics, science, philosophy, religion etc?*
> 
> Many Pakistani-origin Urdu speakers are somewhat anti-Sanskrit because they have no exposure to it. So it sounds like Greek to them. Keep that in mind when deciphering the previous comments.
> 
> *Rather a sweeping and stereotypical statement I am  afraid to say! Let me enlighten readers about a thing or two. Shanul Haq  Haqqi (1917-2005), a renowned Pakistani poet and scholar has translated  "Bhagwad Gita" from the original Sanskrit into Urdu "with remarkable  felicity"* This was done not too long before his death. More recently  and even more renowned translation of Gita was done in Urdu verse by  another Pakistani, Muhammad Ajmal Khan.*
> 
> * *Urdu Literary Culture: TheSyncretic Tradition, Shamsur Rahman Faruqi
> 
> http://www.columbia.edu/itc/mealac/pritchett/00fwp/srf/srf_symcretism_2008.pdf*


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## Qureshpor

tonyspeed said:


> If English is to be avoided, then the Sanskritized terms would be more suitable for technology. Even if the audience doesn't understand the word, at least it sounds long and complex, which is in my opinion what alien technology should sound like.
> 
> *Surely the ultimate purpose behind any language is "communication", even if it happens to be Sanskrit being spoken by aliens! It's no good having "long and complex words" when perhaps only a handful of Sanskrit professors can understand them.*


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## greatbear

QURESHPOR said:


> *I was under the  impression, obviously wrongly, that most Indians understood Bollywood's  so called "Hindi" films. If they don't, then why are they bothering to  go to the cinemas in the first place? **
> *



Because India is a remarkable country with a lot of languages and a lot of code switching: one doesn't have to understand each word everytime. English is also one of the official languages of India, and many and many Indians are very comfortable with it; yet, there are many more who encounter it daily and yet do not know the meanings of many of the words that they encounter. Urdu in present-day India is anyway a lot outdated: with the incursion of more and more English, it is words like "anjuman" and "takmill" that have suffered (I never heard of them before in fact).

You will have to understand India itself and how does this country of diversity communicates with itself to get the answer to your question. For now, it would suffice to say that if "Anjuman" was a film title, then so has been "Matrix" and "Terminator", films that even a village boy in India knows without always knowing the meanings of those words. This ability to absorb a lot and not look for meanings every time is also the very strength of India.

To answer your question about Urdu belt, wikipedia says it well: "In India, Urdu is spoken in places where there are large Muslim minorities or cities which were bases for Muslim Empires in the past."


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## greatbear

QURESHPOR said:


> *Surely the ultimate purpose behind any language is  "communication", even if it happens to be Sanskrit being spoken by  aliens! It's no good having "long and complex words" when perhaps only a  handful of Sanskrit professors can understand them.*



tonyspeed was talking about Sanskritized Hindi, not Sanskrit! More Hindi speakers would understand Sanskritized Hindi than heavy Urdu, and in addition Sanskrit-ish sounds will give the sci-fi effect, which was what the original question.
To take an analogy, if my audience were to to be familiar with both Italian and German, I would use German for the sci-fi/futuristic things.


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## BP.

greatbear said:


> ...
> This ability to absorb a lot and not look for meanings every time is also the very strength of India.
> ...


I think it's unfair for us to cloister the definition of "the very strength" of such a large country to just this. Yet if this is somewhat of a defining characteristic of India, then I think India needs to come out of it. I was like that when I was a bad student. Leaves a void and leads to sub-optimal decisions.
Well this one isn't for the thread, so I'll pull brakes on it.




> ...More Hindi speakers would understand Sanskritized Hindi than heavy Urdu...


Understood, but nobody on this thread suggested "heavy" Urdu, only the 
"rooz marrah" (quotidian) type.

I feel both alternatives suggested intially were quite amusing. maybe the droide should have a 'select-language' option too!


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## xjm

Dear me, I guess it was inevitable this might wander into a debate about Hindi and Urdu linguistic diversity...

Well, as a safely disinterested American student, let me return to the initial question: From our sample here on the forums, it seems the Urdu bolnevales may not be familiar with the Sanskrit vocabulary, and Indians outside the Udru belt may not understand the technical Perso-Urdu vocabulary.  (I suppose this makes sense... while everyday, Bollywood-style Khariboli is understood across much of the subcontinent, the lexical divergence in "technical" language like our android uses is significant.  I read a research paper that indicated the lexicon was even 30% different between Hindi and Urdu popular contemporary newspapers.)  So, I guess there are three options:

Use Perso-Urdu vocabulary for a more Urduized readership, sacrificing some intelligibility for folks outside Urdu regions
Use Sanskrit vocabulary for wider readership in India, sacrificing some intelligibility for folks from Pakistan and other exclusively Urdu regions
Use some English loans and calques instead

And yes, I definitely agree our android should come with a language setting!


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## Qureshpor

xjm said:


> Dear me, I guess it was inevitable this might wander into a debate about Hindi and Urdu linguistic diversity...
> 
> Well, as a safely disinterested American student, let me return to the initial question: From our sample here on the forums, it seems the Urdu bolnevales may not be familiar with the Sanskrit vocabulary, and Indians outside the Udru belt may not understand the technical Perso-Urdu vocabulary.  (I suppose this makes sense... while everyday, Bollywood-style Khariboli is understood across much of the subcontinent, the lexical divergence in "technical" language like our android uses is significant.  I read a research paper that indicated the lexicon was even 30% different between Hindi and Urdu popular contemporary newspapers.)  So, I guess there are three options:
> 
> Use Perso-Urdu vocabulary for a more Urduized readership, sacrificing some intelligibility for folks outside Urdu regions
> Use Sanskrit vocabulary for wider readership in India, sacrificing some intelligibility for folks from Pakistan and other exclusively Urdu regions
> Use some English loans and calques instead
> 
> And yes, I definitely agree our android should come with a language setting!



*I thought I had provided evidence to the contrary, with actual examples from Bollywood films, that the Urdu used in the opening post of this thread is the very language which has been and continues to be used in these films and understood by the general public. I would also like to reassure readers that none of those Urdu words used in the opening post of the thread would pass as "technical Perso-Urdu" vocabulary. Furthermore, I think it would be a gross mistake to label Bollywood film language as "KhaRii Bolii". This is in fact tantamount to calling "biryaanii" (Urdu) as plain rice (KhaRii Bolii), for the latter has had to travel a long long way to reach the state of the former. Another way of looking at this would be if Chaucer's English was considered the same as modern English.

It is unnecessary to talk about the so called "language belts" because I don't believe there is in reality a stretch of land in which there is uniform distribution of one language or another. It might be beneficial for readers to take a look at the pdf document I have attached in one of my posts concerning Urdu and Hindi. Ultimately, whatever vocabulary is used, it needs to be understood by the targeted audience. 

*


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## xjm

Qureshpor: When I say "technical Perso-Urdu" vocabulary, I'm not talking about everyday words like *kitaab*.  (Naturally the fact that this word comes originally from Arabic doesn't alter the fact that pretty much any Hindi speaker understands it).  Maybe I am calling it the wrong thing... I'm just referring to that 30% of the lexicon that is not shared; the words (and constructions) that not all Hindi speakers would necessarily understand.  At least one native Hindi speaker in this thread did not understand the Urdu expressions in your first post.  So, in our small sample of speakers, that makes them Urdu Biryani and not rice.  Urdu Biryani is delicious, but for widest palatability we would stick to plain rice.  Edit: Or, well, choose to make biryani as I suggest, recognizing that not everyone can eat our biryani.  Ismen gosht hota hai ne?  (Am I stretching the metaphor too much?) 

Edit 2: I just realized something.  In Qureshpor's suggestions, which greatbear says were not understood:


> I think your first one is for " Mission accomplished" and the last one " Request for dismissal denied". Is this so? If yes, then I would go for:
> 
> muhim sar-anjaam!
> dar-Khvaast-i-barKhvaast naa-manzuur (Do you like the rhyming effect?)



That's an example of Izafat, isn't it?  The -i- construction?  (Forgive my ignorance.)  There aren't too many morphological differences between modern Hindi and modern Urdu, but I recall that the major two have to do with prefixes and compound nouns.  So it could be the constructions that make it more difficult for a Hindi bolnewala to understand?


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## tonyspeed

QURESHPOR said:


> *Are you suggesting that Urdu is only suitable for  "poetic contexts" and nothing beyond that? Is there no literature in it  for social sciences, mathematics, science, philosophy, religion etc?*
> 
> *Surely the ultimate purpose behind any language is   "communication", even if it happens to be Sanskrit being spoken by   aliens! It's no good having "long and complex words" when perhaps only a   handful of Sanskrit professors can understand them.*



Inside of India, Yes. The question asker states that he is writing a novel in Hindi, not Urdu. So I assume here we are discussing an audience that will primarily be Indian. If we are talking about Pakistan, then this is a different argument altogether.

It is a mistake to conclude that because words of Sanskrit origin fall outside of the realm of colloquial Hindi that they are not understood or would not be understood by the readers of the novel. When I mention the "Urdu bias" effect, this is exactly what I am talking about: The assumption that the average Indian (emphasis on India) would not be able to understand words of Sanskrit origin. 

There are a vast number of Indians that have 1) studied Sanskrit 2) have learned some Sanskrit vocabulary because of its importance in religion or 3) have learned Sanskrit vocabulary because of the Modern Hindi promoted through official channels such as school and newspapers. If we expand our view outside of the Hindi-belt then the argument for the comprehensibility  of Sanskrit vocabulary becomes even stronger because 1) many other colloquial versions of languages have a much higher percentage of Sanskrit vocabulary than colloquial Hindi (Nepali, Bengali, Gujarati, Punjabi, many Dravidian languages).  Also, many Indians outside of the Hindi-speaking belt learn Sanskritised Hindi in school, not colloquial Hindi.

But there is a strong idea floating around that people don't understand Modern Hindi because it is not used colloquially. If that is the case, then who is reading all those Hindi novels that are being produced every year? Who is reading the Hindi newspapers that are being produced every day? I dislike the existence of Modern Hindi just as much as the next Urdu-wallah, but I do cannot deny the fact that it has made some in-roads into the Indian society, whatever my personal views are. 

Maybe the eventual solution to the question asker's problem lies in a careful fusion of Sanskrit, Persian, English and Arabic, much like how Hindustani started out. Maybe there's nothing wrong with being a hybrid after all.


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## BP.

tonyspeed said:


> ... I dislike the existence of Modern Hindi just as much as the next Urdu-wallah...



I think I gave you too much benefit of doubt when you said:


> Many Pakistani-origin Urdu speakers are somewhat anti-Sanskrit because they have no exposure to it.


telling myself you meant 'anti' in its original Greek meaning of 'instead of' rather than its corruption into a synonym of the Latin 'contra'.

Please don't count us in your dislike-club. Some of us do enjoy  listening to current official Hindi, and not just for comic relief.

And hey, there's no h in waalaa!


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## xjm

tonyspeed said:


> Maybe there's nothing wrong with being a hybrid after all.



Oh, so much the opposite!  One thing I like about my native language is its versatility, part of which comes from it being an older hybrid.  And Hindi and Urdu are a whole level again above English.  If English is a mule, Urdu and Hindi are a Tiglon and a Liger.  Or something.  I guess this is tending toward off-topic.  But the take-away for me is that a writer has a lot of choices, not only across the spectrum of vocabulary, but also between a number of different written and spoken registers.  And it leaves me immensely curious to know what a Hindi android would say.


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## Qureshpor

tonyspeed said:


> Inside of India, Yes. The question asker states that he is writing a novel in Hindi, not Urdu. So I assume here we are discussing an audience that will primarily be Indian. If we are talking about Pakistan, then this is a different argument altogether.
> 
> *With due respect to you, Tonyspeed, you are the one who has brought "Pakistan" into the discussion. If you have forgotton, here is what you said:
> 
> *"Many Pakistani-origin Urdu speakers are somewhat anti-Sanskrit because  they have no exposure to it. So it sounds like Greek to them. Keep that  in mind when deciphering the previous comments".
> 
> *There is absolutely no basis in your deduction about Pakistani peoples' views about Sanskrit. The older educated generation may have some knowledge concerning it but the new generation would n't know it even if it was staring them in the face! Besides, I think you seem to be forgetting one small detail. There are still millions of Urdu speakers in India. So, why bring Pakistan in to the Sanskrit debate?
> 
> After the premable, this is what Souminwe said. My reply was based on this question.
> 
> *  "Here are some examples I thought up on the spot. Which one do you see an android soldier saying into the communication chip installed in her brain (lol):
> 
> _lakshya sampuurn_ vs. _manzil takmiil/tamaam_
> 
> _aadesh sviikrit_ vs. _farmaan manzuur_
> 
> _ishT nishkaasan asviikrit _vs. _matluub barkhastagi namanzuur_
> 
> The SanskritnishTh version sounds weird to me...".
> ..........................................................................................
> 
> It is a mistake to conclude that because words of Sanskrit origin fall outside of the realm of colloquial Hindi that they are not understood or would not be understood by the readers of the novel. When I mention the "Urdu bias" effect, this is exactly what I am talking about: The assumption that the average Indian (emphasis on India) would not be able to understand words of Sanskrit origin.
> 
> There are a vast number of Indians that have 1) studied Sanskrit 2) have learned some Sanskrit vocabulary because of its importance in religion or 3) have learned Sanskrit vocabulary because of the Modern Hindi promoted through official channels such as school and newspapers. If we expand our view outside of the Hindi-belt then the argument for the comprehensibility  of Sanskrit vocabulary becomes even stronger because 1) many other colloquial versions of languages have a much higher percentage of Sanskrit vocabulary than colloquial Hindi (Nepali, Bengali, Gujarati, Punjabi, many Dravidian languages).  Also, many Indians outside of the Hindi-speaking belt learn Sanskritised Hindi in school, not colloquial Hindi.
> 
> But there is a strong idea floating around that people don't understand Modern Hindi because it is not used colloquially. If that is the case, then who is reading all those Hindi novels that are being produced every year? Who is reading the Hindi newspapers that are being produced every day? I dislike the existence of Modern Hindi just as much as the next Urdu-wallah, but I do cannot deny the fact that it has made some in-roads into the Indian society, whatever my personal views are.
> 
> *Thank you for your detailed input concerning the position of Sanskrit and its loan words into Hindi and other languages. Frankly, it would not matter one iota to me if Sanskrit eventually drowned all the KhaRii Bolii element of Hindi! But one thing still bugs me. If since 1947 and perhaps even earlier, modern High Hindi with all its Sanskritization is such a living force to contend with, why are Bollywood films still being made in Urdu? I know the censor board gives them the Hindi label but I am sure you and others know exactly what I mean. I can't fully  remember the words of a recent "Hindi" song with the refrain "mii-raqsam". For everyone's benefit, this is 100% Persian. This verbal formation means, "I dance/I am dancing". Why are n't Sanskrit lines used in "Hindi" songs?*
> 
> Maybe the eventual solution to the question asker's problem lies in a careful fusion of Sanskrit, Persian, English and Arabic, much like how Hindustani started out. Maybe there's nothing wrong with being a hybrid after all.
> 
> *Oh, how I wish this had been the case. If you read Shamsur Rahman Faruqi's speech, you will see how this linguistic divide has taken place. And if you think Mr.Faruqi might be somewhat biased, then please read a pdf review by Christopher King entitled, "One Language, Two Scripts: The Hindi Movement in 19th Century North India, Bombay, Oxford University Press".*


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## Qureshpor

xjm said:


> Qureshpor: When I say "technical Perso-Urdu" vocabulary, I'm not talking about everyday words like *kitaab*.  (Naturally the fact that this word comes originally from Arabic doesn't alter the fact that pretty much any Hindi speaker understands it).  Maybe I am calling it the wrong thing... I'm just referring to that 30% of the lexicon that is not shared; the words (and constructions) that not all Hindi speakers would necessarily understand.  At least one native Hindi speaker in this thread did not understand the Urdu expressions in your first post.
> 
> *xjm, I did write a detailed reply to your post but when I tried to post it, it seems to have vanished into the ether! Here is a much briefer version. "greatbear" 's reply was to Souminwe's post no.1. I then presented all the Urdu words which Soumniwe had used and presented evidence from "Hindi" films to prove that they were not words spoken by Martians but were common everyday words. I accept that "barKhaast/gii and takmiil" might not be that familiar but still they are not that remote either, as I have explained in my previous post.*
> 
> So, in our small sample of speakers, that makes them Urdu Biryani and not rice.  Urdu Biryani is delicious, but for widest palatability we would stick to plain rice.  Edit: Or, well, choose to make biryani as I suggest, recognizing that not everyone can eat our biryani.  Ismen gosht hota hai ne?  (Am I stretching the metaphor too much?)
> 
> *I take your point on board that there may be some vegetarians amongst us! But, the point of the matter is that this "biryaanii" is on the menu when it suits some people and off otherwise. In March 2011, in the Indian Parliament Ms. Sushma Swaraj and the Prime Minister Manmohan Singh exchanged Urdu couplets after a heated debate. I am sure you will have heard about this episode and there is no need to quote them here. But I do wonder why the National Language was not used for this purpose.*
> 
> Edit 2: I just realized something.  In Qureshpor's suggestions, which greatbear says were not understood:
> 
> 
> That's an example of Izafat, isn't it?  The -i- construction?  (Forgive my ignorance.)  There aren't too many morphological differences between modern Hindi and modern Urdu, but I recall that the major two have to do with prefixes and compound nouns.  So it could be the constructions that make it more difficult for a Hindi bolnewala to understand?
> 
> *Souminwe did not use any izaafat but it is well known by many many people in India. A "filmii" example
> 
> KhizaaN kaa rang aa chalaa hai mausam-i-bahaar meN. (Film Dulari, 1949). I am sure there will be many recent examples too.
> 
> Autumn's  (yellow) colour is creeping into the (green) spring season.
> 
> You will also know that in the subcontinent Urdu, yes Urdu poets are quoted in all sorts of situations and perhaps the most quoted is Mirza Ghalib. Here is one for you, which every Tom, Dick, Harry and their dog will know!
> 
> dil-i-naadaaN tujhe hu'aa kyaa hai?
> aaKhir is dard kii davaa kyaa hai?
> 
> Oh foolish heart! What has come over you?
> What is the remedy for this ailment, I ask?
> *


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## xjm

Really we should probably move this discussion to one of the existing threads...  /me apologizes in advance and waits for the Hand of Mod.



QURESHPOR said:


> review by Christopher King entitled, "One Language, Two Scripts: The Hindi Movement in 19th Century North India, Bombay, Oxford University Press".



King also has a full-length book, published in '99.  And... well.  I'm not going to let myself list off the entire bibliography of my thesis!  But one article I really recommend is:
Irvine, Judith T. and Gal, Susan (2000). "Language ideology and linguistic differentiation." In: Kroskrity, Paul (ed.), Regimes of Language.  School of American Research Press, Santa Fe, pp. 35–83.

It respectfully considers the impact of language ideology--which seems to be inescapable here--using global examples.  It's very relevant to some of the ideas that have been tossed around above... however, it's not as relevant to the sci-fi question.

I'm actually changing my mind about the android--I think it might actually be very interesting for it to speak a highly Sanskritized, technical Hindi, especially in light of the current sociolinguistic situation in India (including all the things Qureshpor has brought up).

I'm not suggesting this this because I think it would be better understood.  (Although there is a case for that; I think some of the earlier remarks about Indians who have other IIR or Dravidian languages as a _matribhasha_ and learn Sanskritized Hindi in school are relevant as well.) I recommend it because, regardless of one's personal opinions or linguistic affiliation, Sanskritization is a fact in modern India--at least in education and literature, even if the dominance in colloquial speech might be exaggerated--and it is going to affect the evolution of the language's various registers into the future.  Edit 2: I think the contrast between the (programmed) android's Sanskritic, musical Hindi and the rest of the text's "slightly Urduized register" (per the original post) would be realistic and evocative of so many things!

(I'm reminded of the way English and Mandarin are intermingled in Whedon's "Firefly" and "Serenity.")


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## greatbear

I don't understand how does the film argument hold up. Many south Indians watch Hindi films, even the ones not dubbed: next you would be telling me that all of them understand and speak Hindi very well!

Sanskrit, as tonyspeed says, has even wider base in many of the other Indian languages, including the languages of the south. Plus, I, a native speaker of Hindi, neither any of my native speaker friends and relatives, can understand words like "anjuman", but all of us can understand the Sanskrit-derived Hindi words most times. I think that should be the end of this discussion. The original question was about Hindi, and it is Sanskrit-derived Hindi that, according to me, a native speaker of Hindi who has lived among Hindi speakers, is more intelligible to more number of people.

Khari boli has no desire to travel all the way to Urdu (thankfully!).


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## Qureshpor

xjm said:


> Really we should probably move this discussion to one of the existing threads...  /me apologizes in advance and waits for the Hand of Mod.
> 
> 
> 
> King also has a full-length book, published in '99.  And... well.  I'm not going to let myself list off the entire bibliography of my thesis!  But one article I really recommend is:
> Irvine, Judith T. and Gal, Susan (2000). "Language ideology and linguistic differentiation." In: Kroskrity, Paul (ed.), Regimes of Language.  School of American Research Press, Santa Fe, pp. 35–83.
> 
> It respectfully considers the impact of language ideology--which seems to be inescapable here--using global examples.  It's very relevant to some of the ideas that have been tossed around above... however, it's not as relevant to the sci-fi question.
> 
> I'm actually changing my mind about the android--I think it might actually be very interesting for it to speak a highly Sanskritized, technical Hindi, especially in light of the current sociolinguistic situation in India (including all the things Qureshpor has brought up).
> 
> I'm not suggesting this this because I think it would be better understood.  (Although there is a case for that; I think some of the earlier remarks about Indians who have other IIR or Dravidian languages as a _matribhasha_ and learn Sanskritized Hindi in school are relevant as well.) I recommend it because, regardless of one's personal opinions or linguistic affiliation, Sanskritization is a fact in modern India--at least in education and literature, even if the dominance in colloquial speech might be exaggerated--and it is going to affect the evolution of the language's various registers into the future.  Edit 2: I think the contrast between the (programmed) android's Sanskritic, musical Hindi and the rest of the text's "slightly Urduized register" (per the original post) would be realistic and evocative of so many things!
> 
> (I'm reminded of the way English and Mandarin are intermingled in Whedon's "Firefly" and "Serenity.")



*Now that you know where everyone stands, let's have your final version of "technical" terminology for the "Android" itself and the language it speaks.*


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## Qureshpor

greatbear said:


> I don't understand how does the film argument hold up. Many south Indians watch Hindi films, even the ones not dubbed: next you would be telling me that all of them understand and speak Hindi very well!
> 
> *Are you now saying that Indians don't understand "Hindi"! Oh dear! Well, in this case, making the films in Sanskrit and dubbing them into English might be a better option, I would say!*
> 
> Sanskrit, as tonyspeed says, has even wider base in many of the other Indian languages, including the languages of the south. Plus, I, a native speaker of Hindi, neither any of my native speaker friends and relatives, can understand words like "anjuman", but all of us can understand the Sanskrit-derived Hindi words most times. I think that should be the end of this discussion. The original question was about Hindi, and it is Sanskrit-derived Hindi that, according to me, a native speaker of Hindi who has lived among Hindi speakers, is more intelligible to more number of people.
> 
> Khari boli has no desire to travel all the way to Urdu (thankfully!)
> 
> *I am sure you would be aware that both Urdu and the "Mahabharata" serial Hindi and "Duurdarshan" Hindi have their common ancestory in KhaRii Bolii, which in turn ultimately goes back to Sanskrit? So, KhaRii Bolii has already travelled "all the way to" Urdu but it seems that Hindi is travelling "all the way" BACK to Sanskrit!*
> 
> * Yes, let's see what the "Android" itself is in whatever language register is chosen and what words it comes out with. We'll leave it that, shall we? *
> .


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## Faylasoof

*Moderator note:*
*The thread has drifted way off the mark! I regret to say I have to close it! It needs some serious editing / splitting for which we have no time at present!* 

_I have __however __started a new thread on the term *robot* which includes proposed terms for an android and a gynoid / fembot, here. All contributions welcome!_


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