Features of Indian English

Indian English refers to dialects or varieties of English spoken primarily in India and also by Indian Diaspora elsewhere In the world. Due to British colonialism for over two hundred years’ as were used more to British English than to American, Australian ir Canadian English. And due to the presence of vernacular languages in our country,English was chosen to be the co-official language of the union of India. Our obvious choice is one of the varieties of British English; which educated southern British English also called as “Received Pronunciation”

The reasons for these variations are:

· The presence of many vernacular languages

· People learn their mother Language first

· By the time they start learning English, they find it difficult to follow that pronunciation

· They have in them very strongly formed linguistic habits that interface with their learning English

· The phonological system of the mother tongue will have an influence on the phonology of their English

Because of these reasons, Indian English has emerged as another variety of English just like the American, South African,etc,with its own distinctive features.

Since there are several languages spoken in India,there cannot strictly speaking, be something called French English or German English;instead we have a variety of English spoken in India,such as Tamil English, kannada English, Malayalam English,Telugu English, etc

Basing on these varieties,the feature of Indian English can be grouped under phonological and grammatical features.

PHONELOGICAL FEATURES

· Most Hindi speakers of the north such as in Bihar say ‘school’ as ‘iskul’ and ‘stamp’ as ‘istamp’

· ‘fail’ is pronounced as ‘phail’ and ‘fifty’ as ‘phipty’

· English words borrowed from French are sometimes pronounced as written in English spelling.For example,” Bouquet” is pronounced as “boukwet”

· Standard hindi vernaculars donot diffrenciate between /v/ and /w/ as,’va’and ‘wah’ so,’wine’ is pronounced as ‘vine’

· At the usage of ‘ing’ words,an addition is added such as’ga’,like instead of ‘singing’ they use ‘singinga’ or ‘reading’ as ‘readingga’

· ‘cot and ‘caught’ are pronounced as the same

· ‘technology’ is pronounced as ‘techknowlogy’

· Most tamilians say ‘egg’ as ‘jegg’

· Telugu speakers say ‘dzoo’ instead of ‘zoo’

· Malayali speakers replace the sounds of ‘t’,’p’.’b’ with the sound of ‘da’,such as ‘temple’ is pronounced as ‘dembel’ and ‘canteen’ as ‘candeena’

· “English” is pronounced as “inglis”

 GRAMMATICAL FEATURES:

· The progressive tense in stative verbs “I am understanding it”,”she is knowing it” instead of “I understand” “She knows”.This is influence of Hindi grammar.It is common in Northern States.

· The usage of “isnt it”, “no”, “na”, as tag questions;like “you are going,isnt it?”,”I am going,no?”,”she likes it,na?” instead of “you are going,arent you”,”I am going” and “does she like it?”

· Use of’ yaar,ma ,cha,abey,aray’, in english conversation by many of native hindi speakers. The use of the word ‘da,dai,re,ra’ are commonly found in the speakers of south India

· Use of the word ‘ki’ to mean,loosely that such as in “what I mean is ki she is going to adopt her”

· Use off ‘off it’ or ‘on it’ instead of ‘switch it on’ or ‘switch it off’

· Use of ‘current went’ and ‘current came’ instead of ‘power came back’ and ‘power went out’

· Use of the word ‘wallah’ to denote occupation as in ‘the taxi wallah over charged me’ ‘the grocery wallah sold me good grains’

· Over use of the words ‘generally’,’basically’,’actually’,’obviously’ at the beginning of the sentence,like ‘actually, I am not feeling well today’,’generally india will win the match today’

· Use of ‘he is older to me’ instead of ‘he is older than me’

· Usage of ‘out of hundred’ instead of percent,like ‘he got hundred out of hundred’ or’ sixty out of hundred’. the correct usage must be ‘he got a one hundred percent’ or ‘he got a hundred’

 IDIOMS AND PHRASES

Several idiomatic forms crossing over from Indian literacy and vernacular have made their way into the English of masses. These might look strange to a person for whom English is the first language.

· “Your good name please?” instead of “what is your name”-carry over from Hindi expression “subhnaam” which means “auspicious name”

· “out of station” instead of “out of town”

· “deadly and hi-fi” which means,’deadly’-intence and ‘hi-fi’ stylish or beyond the perception of the average person.

Eg-“that movie was deadly yaar,what an action scene”

 “that shoe is hi-fi,where did you get it from?”

· “hello,what do you want?” used by some while answering the phone,which is actually impolite

· “tell me” used when answeing the phone,meaning “how can I help you?”

· “order for food” instead of “order food,as in “lets order for sandwich”

· “pin drop silence” literally means that such a silence should be maintained that even a pin drop can be heard

· “pass out” is meant to graduate,as “I passed out in 1995”

· “freak out” is meant to have fun,as in “lets go to the party and freak out”

· “unless and until” this is called as Indianism by many native speakers. This is uncommon in British english as these two words are not used at the same time.

TITLES (OF RESPECT; FORMAL)

· Referring to elders, strangers or anyone meriting respect as “jee”/’ji’ (suffix) as in “please call a taxi for Guptaji”

· Use of a prefix “shree”/”shri”(Mr) or “Shreemati”/”shrimati”(Mrs/Ms);as in “shree Ravishankar”

· Use of “mr” and “mrs” as common nouns.like

“Jyothi’s Mr came home yesterday”

“My Mrs is not feeling well”

· Use of “Mr”  with the first man,for ex- Ashok Kumar mught be adderssed as “Mr Ashok” instead of “Mr Kumar”

· Use of suffix “uncle”/”aunty” while addressing relatives,strangers,friend’s parents,etc. such as “shopkeeper uncle” “vimala aunty”

· Use of ‘respected sir’ instead of ‘dear sir’ while addressing a letter

In fact, in Indian culture, children or teenagers addressing people as “Mr Patel” or “Mrs Patel” is often considered as an offence or disrespect. If a person is really once’s uncle or an aunt,they will not be addressed as ‘uncle/aunt’ but with the name of the relation in mother language.For example,if a woman is one’s mother’s sister,she would be addressed as “shantha maasi” instead of “shantha aunty” (maasi-Hindi)

INTERJECTIONS AND CASUAL REFERENCES

· Casual use of the words “yaar”(friend,buddy,man), ‘bhai’(brother),’ bhaiyya’(elder brother),’array’ and ‘accha’; much with the American English ‘man’ or ‘buddy’, as in ‘aray comon yaar!dont be such a jerk’ or ‘long time no see bhai?” used to express range of positive emotions but not occasionally as such “array yar what a bad luck!”

· Use of the word ‘T-K’ instead of ‘Okay’ or ‘OK’,like ‘T-K I will meet you tommrow’ (T-K=Thek hai in Hindi)

· Use of the word “uff!” to show distress or frustruation, as in “Uff! The baby is crying again!”

· Along with ‘uff’ there are words such as ‘oh foe! Which mean ‘oh no’ which is more whining and the south Indian equivalent is ‘aiyo’ expanded by ‘aiyaiyo’  as in “oh foe I shud do this again”,”Aiyo I fell in the water again”

· “Lady’s finger” which means okra and “brinjal” means eggplant or aubergine

· “hotel” means resturant in India.”I ate in a hotel” “Lodge refers to a place where you stay(in room) and “hotel” is the place where you eat.

ANOMALOUS USAGE

· The word “marriage” used instead of “wedding” as in “she attending sheela’s marriage”

· The word “mutton” is used to mean goat meat instead of sheep meat.(in a broader sence any red meat, not poultry or fish)

· “saloon” instead of “salon”,as in “I will visit the hair saloon”

· Greetings like ‘happy birthday’ is also said like “today is my happy birthday”

· Use of ‘reduce’ meaning ‘lose weight’ as in, ”have you reduced?”

· The use of phrases such as ‘today morning’ or ‘today evening’ instead of ‘this morning/this evening’

· Use of ‘this side and that side’ instead of ‘here’ or ‘there’, like “bring it this side"

OTHER COMMON USAGE

• Use of the word "only" where the word "just" would be used in other dialects. For example, "These people are like this only".
•  The word "healthy" as a euphemism for fat people, in North India and in general as in "His build is on the healthy side" to refer to a overweight person.
• The word "dress" (noun) is used to refer to clothes for men, women, and children alike: "She bought a new dress for her son", whereas in international varieties of English a dress is a women's outer clothing with a bodice and a skirt as a single garment. The usage of dress as clothes does exist in international varieties but only in very rare occasions and in relevant context., e.g. schooldress. Young girls in India invariably wear a dress, which is called a frock by the Indians.
• "Full Shirt" is used for "Full Sleeves" and "Half Shirt" for "Half Sleeves" or "Short Sleeves". Similarly full-pant means trousers and half-pant means shorts. (Telugu speakers may say "Half Hands" and "Full Hands" in a similar fashion).
•  Intensifying adjectives by doubling them. This is a common feature of most Indian languages. For example: "She has curly-curly hair";  "We went to different-different places in the city in search of a good hotel; "You will get used to the humidity slowly-slowly"; "Don't worry about small-small things" to mean very insignificant issues.
• Use of "blood pressure" or "BP" to refer particularly to high blood pressure, as in "I have BP!" to mean "I have high BP or hypertension".
•  Adding "U" to all english words e.g. LeftU for left, BusU for Bus; especially people from South Indian states mainly Tamil Nadu, Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh have the habit of when speaking Tamil and Kannada and Telugu respectively
• "tight slap" to mean "hard slap".
• Timepass - 'Doing something for leisure but with no intention or target/satisfaction' For example, "Hows the movie?" reply - "Just timepass man... nothing great about it."
• "Hill Station" means mountain resort.
• Use of "Baba" ('father' in some languages, but colloquially meaning 'buddy') while referring to any person, such as "No Baba, just try and understand, I cannot come today".
• the phrase 'the concerned person' is widely used in oral Indian English.'
• Sharma sir is not here - same as Sharma-ji is not here, a respectful address. No knighthood suffix.
•  Use of "chumma chumma" (Tamil: சும்மா means simply) at the beginning of a sentence. (eg. chumma chumma dont talk)
• Paining" used when "hurting" would be more common in Standard American and British: "My head is paining."
• "Cover" to mean envelope or shopping bag in South India. For example, "Put the documents in a cover and post it", and "Put the vegetables in a separate cover". In Western India, especially Maharashtra, a shopping bag is called as a 'Carry Bag'.

   

  In spite of India’s diversity, however, there is indeed a general homogeneity in syntax and vocabulary that can be found among speakers across South Asia. In upper class families, English is tropically very close to Received Pronunciation, while still retaining hints of a uniquely Indian flavor

   

• Written by Swetha Shenoy.
• In category English Language.
• 15 years ago.

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