Sanjay (Xonzoi) Barbora
In an informal aside at an official meeting, a well-known academic mused about the plight of Nagamese as a language. He wondered if anyone was really interested in its development and growth. Those of us with an interest in the history and culture of the region immediately set our minds on a quick scan of occasions when governments and public bodies have done anything to promote Nagamese. I recalled a few instances when Assamese intellectuals – such as Bhupen Hazarika – and public bodies – like the Assam Sahitya Sabha – made efforts to use Nagamese to reconnect the histories and politics of the peoples of Assam and Nagaland. In the 1950s and 1960s, the Assam Sahitya Sabha attempted to maintain a dialogue between the people of Nagaland and North Eastern Frontier Agency (NEFA), against the backdrop of a political dismemberment of the colonial province of Assam. Bhupen Hazarika, the quintessential crowd-pleaser, had a ready Nagamese version of some of his Assamese songs. Clearly, these efforts were not enough to prevent the eventual reorganisation of the region, nor could they elevate Nagamese from the realm of Creole patois. The academic in question then opined that Nagamese was not loved by anyone. Not the government, nor the communities that speak it.
Perhaps there is some truth in his pronouncement. It is not the language that children learn from their mothers. Very few people would claim it be their mother tongue, opting instead to be speakers of Tenyidie, Kyong, Nocte, Sumi or any other language that places them within the realm of a definite language-speaking kin community. Some linguists would therefore claim that Nagamese is not really a language, but merely a degraded remnant of languages that are spoken somewhere else. Although there have not been any studies to look at the origins of the Nagamese, one can imagine that it spread with Christian missionaries moving uphill from Jorhat and Sibsagar, as also with administrators, traders and others working for the colonial state. The missionaries and administrators most certainly were native English speakers, who would have learned some high Assamese in the valley. It is not very difficult to imagine American missionaries and Naga villagers creating Nagamese through the reciprocal imitation of rudimentary language forms, in this case, Assamese, Bengali, Farsi, Urdu and Nepali.
Therein lies the peculiar predicament of Nagamese. It is often dismissed as gibberish that cannot allow a speaker to fully inhabit this language. All governments and academic institutions would consider it to be unsuitable for imparting education, especially since our contemporary society considers English to be the language of power and other languages – such as our mother tongues – to be ones that bind us to our kin communities. It is particularly impossible to use Nagamese to do one’s dealing with officials in courts of law, banks and so on. Neither can it give us access to literature and history, because whatever we wish to communicate (in Nagamese) and in whatever form, seems to be better known elsewhere. Yet I am sympathetic to Nagamese, since as a language it is a tool that helps us make our way in through this world. People learn languages in order to map the society of its speakers and to be able to have some leverage within it. Hence, (if I were in France) I can imagine that learning French would work to my advantage, even though I would be on the lower strata of French society, given my inability to be immersed in its rich literary history. In contrast, Nagamese -- precisely because it is severed from high culture and power -- has a weightlessness to it that is less intimidating. It is not the language that is preferred by the local magistrate, nor does it pretend to exclude its speakers on the basis of knowledge of their literary and class status.
When one speaks two languages, one of which is one’s first language and the other not, one has two selves and is constantly shifting between them depending on the language being used. There is always the possibility of developing a different persona for each. Thus, it is comforting to know that Nagamese circulates without the authoritative control of the administration and is still free of the hierarchies that other languages carry with them. Nagamese can never usurp other languages as Melayu once did in Southeast Asia. However, it allows for a more democratic platform for articulating our collective stories in parts of upper Assam, eastern Arunachal Pradesh and Nagaland. Despite the fact that governments are indifferent to it, it still creates a temporary space for sharing difficult and contentious histories in a way that Assamese, or English can only aspire to. For instance, imagine the diffusion of tension if all border disputes between Assam and its neighbours, Arunachal Pradesh and Nagaland, were to be reported only in Nagamese!
xonzoi.barbora@gmail.com
