Sindhi in the Roman Script: An Investigation into Community Acceptance

2014 Linguistics Seminar Series

Presented by ARVIND IYENGAR, Linguistics UNE

12-1pm 18th June 2014

UNE Oorala Lecture Theatre

This study investigates the acceptability of the Roman script for writing the Sindhi language in India as part of initiatives to enhance heritage language revitalisation efforts. Native to the Sindh province of Pakistan, the language has approximately 21 million speakers worldwide and 2.5 million in India. Although it has constitutional recognition in India, Sindhi is not the official language of any state or region. Sindhi is thus a minority language in the Indian sociolinguistic context.

In India, the Sindhi language is written in both the Perso-Arabic as well as Devanagari scripts, with community opinion divided on which one should be ultimately adopted as the sole script for the language. This script dichotomy hinders literacy acquisition in the language. Moreover, due to a widespread preference for English-language education, among other factors, the community is experiencing language shift. Socially dominant and prestigious languages such as English and Hindi are increasingly being adopted as home languages. This ongoing language shift in the Indian Sindhi community has been widely attested in the literature (see Daswani, 1985; Daswani & Parchani, 1978; Iyengar, 2013; Parchani, 1998)

As a potential solution to facilitate literacy acquisition and consequently promote positive attitudes towards the Sindhi language and encourage language maintenance, this study proposes the Roman script, an idea that was previously suggested by other non-linguist intellectuals in the community. This study will investigate the attitudes of ordinary members of the Indian Sindhi community towards the use of the Roman script in writing the Sindhi language. In the light of the prevailing script divide, the community's geographical dispersion as well as its widespread familiarity with the Roman script (through their exposure to literacy in English), this study posits that the Roman script might be an acceptable medium for the Sindhi language. Based on the data collected and the subsequent analysis and conclusion, the thesis will test and ascertain the viability and acceptability of the Roman script within the Sindhi community.