 |
Business | Industries | Finance | Tax |
| Index: > A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z |
|
|||||
| First Prev [ 1 2 3 4 5 6 ] Next Last |
There are many views on the origins of Urdu, differing in both time and geographic location.
Urdu may have originated anywhere in India: the Deccan, in the Punjab, in Maharashtra, in Bengal, in Sindh or in the neighbourhood of Delhi. These hypotheses are backed by Urdu literature having been found in these areas as far back as the period of the Delhi Sultanate. Keeping in mind the linguistic character of the areas around Delhi, it is often said that Urdu originated in or around Delhi over a period of a few centuries.
A continuous progression is seen in linguistic development from Sanskrit down to the modern languages of Northern India, though there is a very strong link between the Prakritic language 'Hindvi' of the middle ages and Urdu of today. The works of Amir Khusrau are intelligible to the speakers of Urdu/Hindi even though they were written in the 14th century. It is hypothesized that Urdu is the language developed when a regular and slow stream of Arabic and Persian words were infused into the language Hindvi.
Urdu has been known by a host of names during this seven century long interval: Hindvi, Hindi (not to be confused with the modern sister-language), Rekhta, Shahjahani, Deccani, Urdu-e-Mualla, and Urdu. There is some debate as to whether all these names represent the same language, but the majority of experts agree that these are names of the language known today as Urdu.
Although the language orginiated in the neighbourhood of Delhi, it was in the Deccan that it first gained acceptance. The rulers of the Deccan were supportive of local languages, opposing the Persian influence in northern South Asia. There, the court became the centre for the development of Urdu, and propagated the initial Urdu poetry and literature. The idea of using Urdu rather than Persian as the medium for poetry and literature eventually spread to the northern parts of the Indian subcontinent.
After the acceptance of Urdu as a poetic language in North India, a large number of poets began writing in it. Great poets such as Mir , Sauda , Ghalib and Zauq made the language acceptable as a literary medium. The increasing quantity of poetry and literature caused the languge to become more uniform and less volatile than it had been in the past.
Urdu is a member of the Hindustani group of languages, which is a subgroup of the Indo Aryan group of languages, which is in turn part of the Indo European family of languages.
Urdu is related to most of the languages of northern South Asia — they all have similar grammatical structures and even a certain common vocabulary. The Punjabi language is very similar to Urdu. Written Punjabi (in Shahmukhi script) can be understood by speakers of Urdu, with a little difficulty, but spoken Punjabi has a very different phonology (pronunciation system) and cannot be easily understood by Urdu speakers. However, the language mostly closely linked to Urdu is Hindi.
Urdu, Hindi and the consequent Hindustani language have a very strange and complex relationship with each other. Urdu and Hindi have been called different languages on the one hand and dialects of the same language on the other. Hindustani is generally thought of as the language that encompasses both Urdu and Hindi and forms the mother language of these two languages.
The largest difference between Urdu and Hindi is that Urdu is written in the Nasta'liq form of the modified Arabic script while Hindi is written in the Devanagari script.
Urdu, Hindi and Hindustani are all segments on a long linguistic chain. At one end is a heavily Persianized language which is written in the Nasta'liq font and in a modified Arabic script. At the other end is a heavily Sanskritized language which is written in the Devanagari form. The progression from one to the other is continuous and slow. The basic grammars are the same. The words are replaced either by more Sanskritized or more Persianized forms. Urdu forms the segment of the chain more towards the Persian side and Hindi forms the segment of the chain more towards the Sanskrit side. The langugage generally spoken in the north of the Indian subcontinent is basically halfway between the two extremes and represents Hindustani.
Despite this, the casual spoken languages are similar and in some cases not even distinguishable. For example, it is said that Indian movies (of the North and North-West regions, primarily of Bollywood) are made in Hindi, but the language used in many of these movies is exactly the same language used by Urdu speakers in Pakistan. On the other hand, Pakistani TV dramas are said to be made in Urdu, yet the language used in many of these dramas is exactly the language used by Hindi speakers in India.
As the language becomes more formal, the difference between the two languages starts to become clearer. In more serious speech and writing, the Sanskritization or Arabo-Persianization will become more pronounced. The languages used in newscasts, encyclopaedia articles and courtrooms become very heavily Sanskritized or Persianized and may be nearly unintelligible to speakers from the other languages.
| Politics | Business | Finance |
 |
 |
 |
|