#106, Research Paper: ‘The Need of Nativization or Decolonization of the The English language in Indian Perspective’ by Dr. S. R. Bhargava

Dr.Sitaram Bhargava  is an associate professor in English at Govt.college,Jhunjhunu. He is  an M.Phil ( ELT ), PhD ( ELT ) and SLET. He has attended several   national and international seminars , conferences and workshops; his several reaearch papers have been published in reputed journals.  His specialisation is ‘English language teaching’ and  ‘Indian writing  In English’.

Abstract

The present research paper attempts to define the concept of ‘ Decolonization’ or  ‘Nativization’ in terms of English language teaching. Decolonisation, because of its etymological associations with the word ‘ colony ’ in English is generally mistaken only as a political process. The Latin word ‘ colony’ was used in the sixteenth century to mean ‘ farm, settlement, landed estate etc. It took the form ‘ colonized ’ during  the seventeeth century and got more and more converted as ‘colonised ’ ‘colonial’ ‘ colonist’ and ‘ colonization  ’ with emerging European colonies all over the world.

The present research paper also explores the process of nativization or Decolonization in the poetry of some indigenous poets , especially Nissim Ezekiel and A.K.Ramanujan. Decolonization is when a colony of any country becomes independent .Thus, decolonization is opposite of colonization . Sometimes, a colony may not get full freedom , but may become the part of other country or even the part of the country which colonized it . This is decolonization . In some countries, decolonization may result after non- violent discussion. In a relatively small number of cases, decolonization happens only after armed struggle and revolt. Decolonization is different from the break up of traditional empires like the Mongol Empire or the Ottoman Empire.

Introduction

Decolonization generally means independence from the European rule.Major decolonization occurred in the 20^th century . It began with the independence of Pakistan and India in 1947 from the British Empire .Soon thereafter , many countries of African became independent from the rule of many centuries of Europe.  This does not mean that there was no colonialism before the period stated above. Colonialism is essentially a part of power dynamics in any human situation. That is why though dictionaries , even  today, define colonialism as a practice by which a powerful country controls less powerful countries and uses their resources to further its own interests , wealth and power. In the last decade or  so , the word colonialism was used in several  other senses and contexts representing new notions that were dormant..It is not just political power alone that constitutes  ‘power’ and it is used for domination and exploitation ; there are several forms of colonialism. N.Krishnaswamy rightly says-

‘‘ There  are   several    avatars of colonialism in the form of neocolonialism, economic colonialism, cultural colonialism, linguistic imperialism, etc. and these expressions are widely used in current literature. The word ‘ Post- colonialism’ also widely used , implies after colonialism, but as we know colonialism never ends and began perhaps with ‘Adam’ and ‘ Eve ’, Exploitation and power politics are innate human tendencies and it is better to use neocolonialism to talk about different manifestations of power dynamics’. 1

The political subjugation of India generated myths of the cultural and intellectual superiority of the European . In fact, Said went to the extent of saying that the western description of the East in a motivated construct intended to inferiorize the oriental communities. Various theories were constructed to rationalize the colonial situation . It would be proper here to mention a theory put forward by Octavio Manony in his book’ Prospero and Caliban: The psychology of Colonialism. He points that the backward people’ are colonized because they suffer from an unresolved ‘ dependence complex’. This leads them to revere their ancestors and to transfer their reverence to their colonial master. This is an example of a clever theory based on a generalization that tries to explain an historical situation that is always to be explained away by such pseudo psychological theory . If ancestor worship is the only reason for accepting colonial rule , it may be argued why China and Japan , countries where ancestor is almost a religion, did not become colonies in the sense India became one. Decolonization of English Studies , also involves an open discussion of such clever sounding theory of colonization.

As a consequence , such myths controlled our behaviour and our self image. English education that came to India in the wake of the colonial rule may have strengthened such myths. Decolonization of English studies , then , is the process of deconstructing such myths and of realizing that history is not a very safe guide to know the essential nation.History like literature, is a human construct and despite its apparent objectivity it may not be free from prejudices. A historian may decide to organize reality in such a manner as to achieve a political end .It is also possible that such decision may be unconscious . Teachers of English in India , thus have a great responsibility to decolonize the young mind and this responsibility is no less than that of a teacher of history or political science. To argue, for instance, that Indians discovered themselves intellectually only after a contact with the West is rather specious. Such an argument in itself does not explain why India has produced such brilliant software engineers while many countries in Africa that had a similar contact with the west have failed to do so. The intellectual excellence of a country is built over a period of centuries. The people who wrote the subtle arguments of the Upanishads and who discussed the abstractions of Indian philosophy were the same people who are putting satellites in space.

It is beyond doubt that language and literature have always been used by colonizers as a powerful tool in the process of colonization , be it political colonization or gender colonization . All knowledge , wisdom, science , technology and modernization is projected as Eurocentric , likewise all languages are ‘man- made’ in India , English education is urban-based . In a way this kind of power dynamics is being studied in the name of ‘ Post colonialism’ feminism’ Marxism’ Deconstruction’,etc. but not much has been done in the area of English education or English teaching in India. We still continue to live on ‘ received knowledge’ and ‘ received theories ’. Our mindset continues to be colonial in every sense of the term. Unless there is a mindshift , no substantial change can be brought about in the field of education/ English teaching.

Decolonisation means getting the perspective right. It also means making a better use of our resources . Decolonisation does not mean making ‘ narcissism a fettish nor does it mean a heavy dose of jingoism to counter a feeling of collective inferiority.’ Such an approach is out of tune with the logic of history. Decolonisation of studies would mean saying to ourselves that Indian critical theories and texts are as good as those anywhere , but no better. The phrase ‘ but no better ’ is very important because it helps us keep our sanity in an emotionally unstable situation. Turning over the pages of the history of English teaching in India , we find that we still remain the followers of the britishers. As a matter of fact, our teaching remains traditional and mechanical..English teaching in India is carried on mechanically as a ritual without any involvement whatsoever on the part of teacher or learners; the whole exercise is examination oriented . The reasons for this frustrating experience are quite obivious. We, as N.Krishnaswamy rightly says: –

‘In Post-independence India , even after 50 years of political freedom, are still living on Received knowledge and Received experience , partly because of the legacy of colonialism and partly because of our own admiration for the West. English education and English teaching in India still follows the stated objectives in the famous Macaulay’s Minute of 1835 and his curriculum. It is indeed a pity that we did not even learn nothing from the struggle for independence , at that time the enlightened natives ( according to Macaulay they were enlightened by western education and their command of English to subvert the power of the British Empire.As a matter of fact, it is English education that in a way endangered the position of the rulers . This is one of the unexpected reversals in the history of English education in India from which we ought to have drawn some lessons on how and for what purpose we are to use English. We did not follow the lead of leaders like Swamy Vivekanand who projected Indian spiritualism and sensibility in English. ‘ Such things happened outside the educational system and the educational system has remained colonial in character .’

All this is history but at some point we have to make an attempt to decolonize English education / literature/teaching in India. It is pertinent to describe here as to what the scholars , writers and critics think about decolonizing English in India. N.krishnaswamy rights  thatenglish can be decolonized by teaching it through Indian values and heritage.He says: –

‘ Like in the field of medicine , where there is a growing revival of interest in native cures, home remedies, yogic cures, herblogy, Ayurveda, Unani, Homeopathy, etc.as alternatives to what is known as ‘English medicine’ or the allopathic system of medicine, which has no effective treatment for a number of ailments, in the fields of English education, alternatives must be evolved, keeping in view the new perceptions , changing realities and post independence objectives. Our learners must be able to talk about Panini , Bhartrihari, Nagarjuna, Shankara and Tolkappiar and their language philosophy in effective English so that the world may know that we have a rich tradition that can engage the best and the latest in modern western thought, this can reinstate our pride and pleasure in our own mental efforts that was swept away,annihilated, degraded and depressed by the then calculated moves of the rulers; we should regain our confidence and feel that we are capable of aspiring to great intellectual distinctions. We should demonstrate that the Reader response theory in western literary criticism can be en enriched by our theory of Rasa , we should formulate our  concepts of tragedy based on our literature , literary and philosophical traditions instead of starting with Aristotle . We must be in position to talk about Bharathi Vallathol, Jayakanthan ,Pillai, Kalki,Valmiki , Tenalirama, Kamban, Tulsidas ,Premchand and many others in effective English.We must talk about Adoor Gopalkrishan, K.Balachander, Shyam Benegal, or Satyajit Ray and others in communicable English ; we should be able to tell the world that in mathematics , medicine , plant life and its applications , music and dance , astronomy, architecture , chemistry ,grammar, logic and rhetoric, philosophy, astrology and many other areas the contributions of our thinkers and scholars can match anything that has been done anywhere in the world and this has to be done in English . We must use English but project India , that should be the aim of English education in general and English teaching in particular.’’

In his ‘foreword To Kanthapura’(1938), Raja Rao emphasizes the need of the nativisation of English , which should carry an unmistakable Indian touch and colour about it. He writes : ‘ Yet English is not really an alien language to us. It is the language of our intellectual make up- like Sanskrit  or Persian was before.- but not our emotional make up… We can not write like the English . We should not. We can not write only as Indians. We have grown to look at the large world as part of us .Our method of expression therefore has to be a dialect which will someday prove to be as distinctive and colourful as the Irish or the American. Time alone will justify it. 2

Here we intend to examine the decolonization of English in the post-independence Indian English poetry in the hands of Nissim Ezekiel  and A.K.Ramanujan , G.V.Desani, Anita Desai ,Shashi Deshpande and Arundhati Roy  have admirably contributed , in contemporary Indian English fiction , to the process of nativisation and decolonization of the Queen’s English or the king’s English.In the domain of contemporary Indian English poetry , Ezekiel and Ramanujan have carried forward this practice and experimented with English in a new and novel form.

As a matter of fact , a substantial change has been brought about in the field of Indian writing in English by nativising it. This nativisation ( and glocalisation to some extent ) meant decolonizing Indo-Anglian literature. The Indian creative writers in English use the English language in a way that is distinctively Indian and still remain English.The Indian writers have been able to achieve the interfusion of ‘the world of words ’and ‘the world of Indian sensations’.We therefore aim at examining how this interfusion of the two worlds has been achieved by the Indian writers in their creative works, with special reference to the poetical works of Ezekiel and Ramanujan. 3

The nativisation of English language and literature initiated by the indigenous Indo-Anglian writers can be seen ‘ as a process of unlearning the received theories ’( and it is the process of unlearning the received theories and received knowledge that constitute decolonization). We also aim at bringing out the myth and history, language and landscape, self and the other and the important ingredients of post colonialism. It also intends to prove that the poetry of Ezekiel and Ramanujan does not have any colonial hangover and charts out a peculiarly Indian cultural ethos and linguistic atmosphere.

Chinua Achebe (1965) says that English is to be altered to suit its new surroundings. He writes: ‘ Can an African ever learn English well enough to be able to use it effectively in creative writing ? Certainly yes… if on the other hand you ask: Can he ever learn to use it like a native speaker ? I should say , I hope not’. It is neither necessary , or desirable for him to be able to carry the weight of my African experience . But it will have to be  a new English , stil in communication with its ancestral home but altered to suit its new African surroundings.’ 4

The call for the decolonization of the English language is a crystallised  expression of a historical process, which has been going on for almost two centuries. However, the intensity and speed of the decolonization of the English language in the novel of colonial conciousness has its being in the co-existence of a plurality of voices, which test and contest the colonial space in the terrain of language to cleanse it of the unwashed odour of the chamchas as Rushdie puts it .The empire is striking back,warns he with a new force collected from diverse sources . While the empire installed a ‘ standard’ metropolitan language on its subjects through its system of education , the subjects are now writing back the ‘ non standard ‘ marginalized ,‘variant’ English language . It has been usurped , abrogated and appropriated to make it culturally relevant .’

Salman Rushdie(1982) also emphasizes the need of decolonizing English . He says:

‘Something of the unwashed odour of the chamcha lingers around its (English language ) cadences. The language like much else in the newly independent societies , needs to be decolonized , to be re made in other images, if those of us who use it from position outside Anglo-Saxon culture are to be more than artistic Uncle Toms . And it’s this endeavour that gives the new literatures of Africa , The Caribbean  and India much of their present vitality and excitement. ’5

Discussing this new phenomenon of ‘ abrogation’ and ‘ appropriation’ of the English language by the post colonial writers , Bill Ashcroft , Gareth Griffiths and Helen Tiffin in ‘ The Empire Writes Back(1989) develop a theory for this literature , which they call ‘english’ literature to distinguish it from the canonical , hegemonic’English ’ literature of Great Britain. They note that  –

‘‘ The crucial function of language as medium of power demands that post-colonial writing define itself by seizing the language of the centre and replacing it in a discourse fully adapted to the colonized place . There are two distinct processes by which it does this.The first, the abrogation or denial of the priviledge of ‘ English’ involves a rejection of the metropolitan power over means of communication. The second, the appropriation and reconstitution of the language of the centre , the process of capturing and re-moulding the language to new usages, marks a separation from the site of colonial privilege.’’ 6

The subject of deprivileging  the English language of the colonizer and re privileging the English language of the colonized was locked in the debate of the ‘ standard’ and’variant’ use of language a few decades ago. This having been settled in favour of margin has resulted in the de-centering  of the English language in the works of colonial conciousness. The history of English as the language of colonization goes back to the days of colonization of Ireland as it was the first nation to be faced with the problems that result from English as a language of colonization.James Joyce’s ‘A Portrait of the artist as a young man’ provides ‘ the classical model ’ for these problems.

The question of the foreignness of English has bothered almost all the novelists of India.Mulkraj Anand has written a full book ,’The King Emperor’s English’(1948) besides a number of articles in defence of Indian English .Raja Rao , in his famous ‘Foreword ’ to kanthapura and  his ‘ Introduction’to the ‘  Serpant and the Rope’writes about his kind of English.He however, does not address himself to the problem of  defining his choice of English .R.K.Narayan too dismisses the question in a couple of articles , such as ‘ English in india’,etc. R.K.Narayan abrogates and appropriates the English language through ‘ collocation’ and ‘ semantic shifts’. Raja Rao does it by ‘hybridization,’ ‘style variation’,language’ overlap’ and also by developing the word in a situation so as to extend the lexical parameters of his English to make it culturally relevant. Mulk Raj Anand nativizes English primarily through ‘ code switching ’and ‘ code mixing’- the two devices which Raja Rao has used sparingly. Like other Indian novelists , Anand generally works in a bi-lingual continuum. He therefore employs strategies of code switching and vernacular transcription .Anand also uses Indianisms abundantly in a variety of ways in diction , phraseology ,idiom, imagery and dialogue. This gives a Punjabi flavour to his English. 7

To conclude,  it is thus obvious that the purpose in this research paper is to capture the process and devices of the indianness of the nativized variety of English used by the ‘indigenious ’ Indian poets to present the Indian ethos in their poetical works. As Raja Rao says, ‘ as long as we are Indians – that is not nationalists, but truly Indians of the Indian psyche – we shall have the English language with us and amongst us, and not as guest or friend, but as one of our own, of our caste, our creed , our sect and of our tradition. The aim of this paper is to analyze those processes which have been employed by Indian poets , particularly Nissim Ezekieland A.K.Ramanujan to decolonize and nativize the ‘ Guest and Friend’ as one of our caste and tradition.

REFERENCES Krishnaswamy, N ( 2000)  Excerpts From The Lecture Delivered In The UGC Referesher  Course In English At CIEFL.

Rao, Raja ( 1974 )  Foreword To Kanthapura, New Delhi, OUP

Ezekiel,Nissim, Two poets( 1972) : A.K.Ramanujan and Keki N. Daruwalla in ‘The Illustrated Weekly Of India, New Delhi OUP

Ashcroft , Bill,et al ( 1989 ) ‘ The Empire Writes Back , London Routledge ’

McCutchion, David(1969)‘Indian Writing In English-Writers’Calcutta workshop.

Manoni , Octavio, (1969) Prospero and Caliban: The Psychology of Colonization.Trans.P.powesland.Methen. London