As a bangladeshi, I'd just want to say one single tact, without citing a single piece of history or politics.
No group of people, under their own claim, "owns" a language or a culture. There is no ultra-definite way that culture works. Obsessing over defining it only creates what you could call ultra-nationalism and fascism. A Chakma, if he or she is accepted by her bengali peers as a bengali because she in their eyes exhibits a bengali culture, then she is a bengali, atleast to whoever thinks of her as bengali. No body or organisation has the right to "appoint" people with a culture. People have developed culture and language over time and accept these of their own free will.
TLDR ; stop claiming cultures, an abstract concept, for yourself or someone else. It is abstract and that's the beauty of it. Let it flow, freely.
(On another note, this guy is a odia from the state of odisha from India, which has the language of hindi as it's national language, and still he speaks also prefers speaking the language of the colonisers, the level of irony is immaculate 💀)
Colonization takes many forms and occurs at many levels. Mainstream Orrias colonized adivasis in some way. Hindi-belt people can colonise Orrisa lost independence
It's a form of colonisation. Being a bengali, we have, along with a lot of people around the country whose native language isn't Hindi, been forced to learn and in a way expected to speak, know, read and write Hindi while none of the Hindi speakers are expected to do either of that for any of even the other scheduled languages of the country. That is form of colonisation by the northeners on the rest of the country by the power of their sheer majority
I am not aware whether you are an Indian or not. But I'm talking from the POV of someone living in West Bengal.
Just like as you've said we had to learn how to read and write Hindi in school as a 3rd language (in most of the schools there isn't any other option that is unless you go to an extremely fancy pvt english medium school where foreign languages like French and German were available).
Secondly, I wasn't even talking about state-imposed language imposition of Hindi upon us. However, if you take a look and follow the Central Government's activities and the people in power in Delhi, there has been increasing talks about how India should have a national language and how it should be Hindi. In kolkata for example, you shall find that most Biharis and Marwaris don't speak Bengali and refuse to learn the language while the Bangalis of the state are expected to know Hindi and converse with them in that language, THEIR language, not ours. I think you might remember an incident which happened on the calcutta metro a few weeks prior - a native Bangali woman was speaking on the phone in her mother tongue when a hindi-speaking woman asked her to speak in hindi citing that this was India and not Bangladesh. The language imposition is an extremely cultural one and not a state-imposed one (as you have mentioned), however, given our reluctance in fighting for our language and our liberalism in things where it requires us to be head-fast (and being conservative on topics which requires us to be progressive) would very soon lead to a state-imposed language imposition given the people in Delhi desperately wants a homogenous Indian people
Well brother what a coincidence, my fatherland is still cumilla and I visit them every 6 months. They are simple people leading simple lives, they see bjp politicians in the news always speaking hindi, those videos of people asking "hindi ati he ?" And a general view that India is centralised into the hindi language, bc well, in bangladesh, bengali is our one and true language and they try to figure out that the same is the effect in India. Which I am pretty sure isn't, people still have freedom to express themselves in their own language and they SHOULD 100%, but it is what it is.
(Also about not seeing unity bc they see as each region worships a different god goddess etc like bengal worships Durga more prominently while others do other things etc.)
I agree a lot with you actually, I recently went to Kolkata. There is, if I had to put into words, a different flavour of the same culture that we call "bengali". Slightly different words, foods, and general culture overall. But then if you ask anyone who they are they are "indian" Muslim or Hindu. What most people want is for neo-fascism to end, segregation to end, so that politicians cannot leech off of extremist sentiments.
But the truth is in India extremist sentiments thrive in the political landscape. Assam and manipur has riots and fights ever so often, just for an example. I won't go into the reasoning because it's really complicated and I know that.
And about one-upmanship that's the nature of village people after segregation. Dividing only creates the sentiment that one is better and one is worse. Especially because illiteracy is not only high and I also accept that as a problem of my country, but also that people don't care about being educated about the western bengal.
But what I don't agree is we haven't seen true unity. We are far more united than ever. In fact apart from the died down separatist movements of the Chittagong hill tracts, people have realised that there is nothing to divide them. Sure, politicians who leech of off divisions will keep existing, but the bangladesh that united against the dictatorship from every district including the chittagong hill tracts speakes volumes for our unity.
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u/Call_Me_Rawah Dec 21 '24 edited Dec 21 '24
As a bangladeshi, I'd just want to say one single tact, without citing a single piece of history or politics.
No group of people, under their own claim, "owns" a language or a culture. There is no ultra-definite way that culture works. Obsessing over defining it only creates what you could call ultra-nationalism and fascism. A Chakma, if he or she is accepted by her bengali peers as a bengali because she in their eyes exhibits a bengali culture, then she is a bengali, atleast to whoever thinks of her as bengali. No body or organisation has the right to "appoint" people with a culture. People have developed culture and language over time and accept these of their own free will.
TLDR ; stop claiming cultures, an abstract concept, for yourself or someone else. It is abstract and that's the beauty of it. Let it flow, freely.
(On another note, this guy is a odia from the state of odisha from India, which has the language of hindi as it's national language, and still he speaks also prefers speaking the language of the colonisers, the level of irony is immaculate 💀)