International Research Journal of Social Sciences______________________________________ ISSN 2319–3565 Vol. 5(1), 35-41, January (2016) Int. Res. J. Social Sci. A Hisotrical and Political Sociological account of the Dynamic status of Konkani Langauge in Pre- Liberation Goa, India Joanna P. Coelho Department of Sociology, Goa University, Goa, INDIA [email protected] Available online at: www.isca.in Received 23rd November 2015, revised 31st December 2015, accepted 10th January 2016 Abstract Multilingualism in India has occupied the imagination of social scientists. Indian multilingualism is so proverbial that people often wonder how communication takes place. Continually emerging new powerful languages challenge the existing socio political order. As society and polity changes, the socio political status of a given language also change. The socio- political status of a language is not static it is liable to change as society and polity changes. This paper considers the dynamic relationship between Konkani language and society in Goa. Based on literature review and personal interviews with a number of language protagonists, this paper attempts to document the dynamic status of Konkani in pre Liberation Goa. Keywords: Konkani, Language, Public sphere. Introduction religious status was accorded to the vernaculars of the more powerful adjacent territories, Karnatak and Maharashtra3. India is a multilingual giant. Language addition rather than attrition is an important feature India’s multilingual heritage. Unlike many other parts of India, Goa was never under a local Continually emerging new powerful languages challenge the ruler at any period in history. Each ruler thus imposed his existing socio political order. The socio political status of a language and script in the public sphere in Goa. Konkani 1 given language also changes with the changes in society . This suffered at the cost of the neighbouring languages which paper is a historical account of the Konkani language movement because of political patronage increased its hold over the region, in Goa. especially in the areas of administration and education. When Goa was under the sway of Kannada-speaking dynasties, The articulation and development of multilingualism in Goa Kannada dominated over the local language. The Yadavas, the follows a different pattern from that which is found in other Bahamanis and the Sultan of Bijapur who ruled over portions of parts of India. While in the rest of India there has been a shift the Konkan for a time, gave Marathi official standing. The from functional to assertive or contested multilingualism, in vacant places of the Konkani Brahmins, who migrated to the Goa the situation was altogether different. Because of its unique Vijayanagara Empire, were taken up by the less qualified socio political history, Goa has always seen interplay of Maratha Brahmin priests. These Maratha Brahmin priests raised language, religion and governance. In Goa, the dialectic their own vernacular to the position of Konkani. between language and religion has ensured that the phase of contested multilingualism in the public sphere began almost five The system of education in pre-Portuguese Goa was largely centuries ago. This paper is a chronological elaboration of this religious in nature. When the Portuguese conquered Goa, they dynamic phenomenon. Through a historical and political did not meet unlettered or illiterate masses of people, but those sociological account, I have attempted to explicate how well versed in Sanskrit and Marathi religious literature (Souza multilingualism has given rise to multiple public spheres in Goa. 1977: 13). The formal education which was limited to the three upper castes was provided at pathshalas or parishads by Goa’s Linguistic History schoolmasters or aigals in local languages4. The teachers who were called Sinai or Shennoy or Shenvi Mama were actually Language being intrinsic to territory, Konkani’s history is linked Maharastrians who were employed in Goa usually as clerks. to the history of the land of its speakers. The Konkani language They would also teach the children of their employers as well as is spoken throughout the narrow strip of land which is bounded neighbouring children usually in the balcony of big residential on the north by Malvan, on the south by Karwar, on the east by 2 houses. In course of time they opened their own informal the Western Ghats, and on the west by the Arabian sea . But schools, called Shenvi mama schools. As these teachers came Pereira (1992: 8) laments that this oldest of modern tongues was from Maharastra, they taught in Marathi. Hence Marathi became not fated to reign in its own home; very early, official and the medium of instruction in schools in pre-Portuguese Goa . International Science Congress Association 35 International Research Journal of Social Sciences____________________________________________________ISSN 2319–3565 Vol. 5(1), 35-41, January (2016) Int. Res. J. Social Sci. Despite the isolation of Konkani in the political, religious and cohesive community feeling and assertiveness among Konkani educational spheres, Konkani continued as the language of the speakers and the rule by outsiders, the growth and development private sphere. Until the arrival of the Portuguese, there was no of the Konkani public sphere was limited. objection to using Konkani for non-official and non-religious purposes. In fact, not only with regard to language, but in other Konkani under Portuguese Regime spheres as well, the various rulers did not intervene in the mundane life of the people. Regardless of who was the ruler, As the influence of over 451 years of Portuguese rule in Goa, life in Goa continued undisturbed with its unique religious has been tremendous, I have focussed on this period at length. practices, rituals and beliefs and language serving as markers of When Goa was under Mohamedan rule, Timoja, who was the Goan identity. While rulers changed from time to time, the commander of the Vijayanagar fleet, induced the Portuguese Gaunponn remained, hence the attachment and fidelity to the chieftain Afonso de Albuquerque to enter Goa on 17 February 6 village and their mother tongue was stronger than loyalty to the 1510 . rulers and their official language of administration. The early Portuguese: From Ignorance to Dominance: When Despite not having official patronage, the language was the Portuguese set sail for India, they had a twofold aim: control developed by the people. It also drew on the resources of it’s of the spice trade based in South India and rescue of Christians neighbours like Marathi and Kannada, and in turn, supplied to who they believed were under siege. They hoped to find the them from its own fund. It developed a script of its own, the legendary Prester John and Christians who were converted by Kandvi or Goym Kannadi, which encompassed all speech Thomas the Apostle in South India, but were now being sounds in the language, thus setting it apart from the Halle or persecuted. Though they did not find Prestor John, they did find Old Kannada script of the then prevailing rulers (Gomes 2000: what they saw as a thriving Eastern Christianity that was so 21)5. Thus on the cultural level at least, it carved for itself a unlike theirs. They then went about converting the local separate identity. Goans adapted and assimilated the influences populace to Christianity. of their Brahminical, Buddhist, and Jain heritage as part of their identity. Gradually, it was given visibility in the public domain, Though the initial Portuguese policy was of non interference at least sporadically. Konkani began appearing on inscriptions with religious practice, it did not last for long. Religious mission during the reign of various rulers. The most outstanding of the was never separate from mercantilism, and conversion from inscriptions is the one that is scrawled across the foot of the commerce. The Portuguese king functioned as the Grand Master giant granite monolith of Bahubali, the Jain Tirthankara, the of the Order of Christ and by a series of Papal Bulls (religious Gomateshwara, at Sravanabelagolla in the Hassan district of decrees) passed between 1452 and 1456 , was given authority to 7 coastal Karnataka dated 1116-17 AD5. Copper plate and stone conquer, subdue and convert all pagan territories . inscriptions dating back to the twelfth century have also been unearthed in Konkani in Kandvi or GoymKannadi script. Lusitanisation was for Konkani a force at once destructive and liberative; destructive because as a channel of an intolerant During that period there were also various inscriptions in westernisation, it aimed at absorbing Konkani culture into itself; Marathi which borrowing number of words, phrases and idioms liberative because it freed Konkani from the oppression of in Konkani asserted the native community’s tongue as being another intolerant and corrosive, but far less sophisticated suppressed by the dominant ruler’s alien rule. culture-the Maratha. Apart from copper inscriptions, Konkani was also incorporated Thus with the arrival of the Portuguese policy of Lusitanisation, into literature. Old Marathi classics like the Dnyaneshwari the public sphere in Goa saw an interplay of a variety of forces which is the Marathi translation of the Bhagvad Geeta, and the and agents: religious conversion, political expediency, the Lila Charitra of the Mahanubhav movement of Sri Chakradhar dominance of Portuguese, the counter-dominance of Marathi Swami contain a large number of Konkani words, idioms and and attempts at Konkani perseverance and eventual resurgence. phrases. Thus, Konkani resources were thought to be qualitatively good enough to be used for Marathi classical Lusitanisation and Language: From Destruction to writings. Development: When the Portuguese arrived in Goa, they first demolished temples and Hindu literature written in vernacular Thus works in Konkani prose and poetry were part of the native langauge. There was even a desire to exterminate those in the Goan contribution to the language. The language was also population that had no desire to convert. But, after some time, written in more than one script.