Commonly referred to as the ‘Hindi heartland’, Uttar Pradesh is the most populous and the fourth largest state of India. Its linguistic tapestry is unique as it is home to not just Hindi and a host of other Scheduled and Non-Scheduled languages, but also to some secret tongues, devised purely to communicate within smaller communities by their members. This volume, People’s Linguistic Survey of India, The Languages of Uttar Pradesh (volume twenty-nine, part two) focusses on the majority as well as minority languages of the state: linguistic characteristics, grammatical features, folklore and vocabulary of various languages are discussed to give readers as broad a sense of the languages as possible.
G. N. Devy is the chief editor of the PLSI series. He taught at the Maharaja Sayajirao University, Baroda, till 1996 before leaving to set up the Bhasha Research Centre in Baroda and the Adivasi Akademi at Tejgadh. There, he worked towards conserving and promoting the languages and culture of indigenous and nomadic communities. Apart from being awarded the Padma Shree, he has received many awards for his work in literature and language conservation.
Badri Narayan is a social historian and cultural anthropologist and the Director of GBPSSI, Allahabad. His interests range from memory and politics, contemporary histories, ethnography of marginalised politics, to Dalit and subaltern issues and identity formation and the question of power. He is the author of The Making of the Dalit Public in North India: Uttar Pradesh, 1950–Present and editor of Uttar Pradesh-Ki Bhashayein (PLSI).
Rama Shanker Singh has an MA in Ancient History of India and PhD on community rights of subaltern castes from GBPSSI, Allahabad. His research interests are the life, language and politics of nomadic communities of Uttar Pradesh. Some of the translations he has worked on are Jati ke Viruddha Gandhi Ka Sangharsh (2019) and Khandit Akhyan: Bhartiya Jantantra Mein Adrishya Log (2018).
The People’s Linguistic Survey of India The National Editorial Collective List of Volumes Acknowledgements Foreword A Nation Proud of Its Language Diversity: Chief Editor’s Introduction Introduction to the Volume Contributors to the Volume An Appeal to Readers List of Languages Covered in the Volume Abbreviations
PART I: SCHEDULED LANGUAGES 1. Hindi 2. Nepali 3. Urdu 4. Sindhi
PART II: NON-SCHEDULED LANGUAGES 5. Awadhi 6. Bagheli 7. Baiswari Awadhi 8. Bhojpuri 9. Brajbhasha 10. Bundeli 11. Illahabadi 12. Kannauji 13. Kauravi 14. Tharu PART III: OTHER LANGUAGES 15. Chamarmangata 16. The Language of Mahavats 17. The Language of Nats and Kanjars 18. The World of Secret Tongues: The Languages of Nishads and Pandas
Appendix The Lost Keys of Culture
Index