English in India

The English in India

Where is India?

India is a large country located in southern part of Asia. In fact the region is more specifically referred to as South Asia or Indian Subcontinent.

How did english became an official language in India?

Just as in the Caribbean, the English Language arrived in South Asia as a result of colonisation. Unlike its history in the Caribbean, however, English has always co-existed in the Indian subcontinent alongside thousands of local languages. So for most of the population, it has only ever been a second language.

English in India today

It is used in the media, in Higher Education and government and therefore remains a common means of communication. According to recent surveys, approximately 4% of the Indian population use English. Is the largest English-speaking community outside the USA and the UK. English is virtually a mother tongue for many educated South Asians, but for the vast majority it remains a second language.

Asian influence

In terms of pronunciation, many speakers do not differentiate between the sounds <v> and <w>. They might also replace <th> in words like think and this with a <t> and <d> sound, as no Indian languages contain these consonants. Anyone who has experience of speech in the UK's Asian communities will also have encountered the phenomenon of code-switching mixing words, phrases or even whole sentences from two different languages within the same conversation. The occasional or even frequent use of a Hindi  word or expression within an English sentence can communicate a great sense of shared identity or solidarity with other speakers. This characteristic feature of Asian speech has led commentators to coin popular terms, such as Hinglish ( Hindi and English) or Pinglish ( Pakistani and English).

Indian English Vs American English

In India, English is one of our official languages that we have all learned irrespective of our mother tongues. Whether we go from South to North, East to West for education or business, our medium of communication stands out to be English. However, we Indians are highly influenced by British English and we follow British norms when it comes to vocabulary. So, we often see several noticeable differences in words usage between Indian English and US English, like for example, we call the dot at the end of a sentence as ‘Full stop’, they call ‘Period’, we say ‘Purse’, they say ‘Wallet’. Knowing these vocabulary differences help you when you communicate with an American.Here we have some examples:

-The school Staff is called as Faculty

-We say Timetable, they say Schedule

-We say Curd, they say Yogurt

-We say Cup Cakes, they say Muffins

-The Boot of a car is known as Trunk

-You don’t clean the car, you do car wash

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