http://www.navhindtimes.com/stories.php?part=news&Story_ID=041628Konkani
independent language, not a dialect, says Fr Naik
NT News Service
Mapusa April 15: There is a belief that a language that is spoken more
than it is written is a dialect and that which has more written
literature is a language. That belief is a myth and not a fact. This
was stated by the director of the Thomas Stephens Konkani Kendra
(TSKK), Fr Pratap Naik at the history hour at the Xavier Centre for
Historical Research, Porvorim today. The history hour was dealing with
the topic, ?Konkani: myths and facts.?
Fr Naik said there is a belief that just because there is a relatively
low volume of written Konkani literature though it is commonly spoken,
it is a dialect of some other language and not a language itself. This
belief is a myth.
Fr Naik cited the example of the Tullu language of Karnataka and said
that though there is little written literature in Tullu, it is an
independent language and not a dialect of any other language. He also
demolished the myth that just because there is no separate script for
Konkani, it is not an independent language stating that even Sanskrit
does not have its own original script. Another myth that was broken by
Fr Naik was the belief that Konkani is a daughter of Sanskrit. Stating
that this is not true, he said it is difficult to say which is language
and which is a dialect.
There is yet another belief that prior to the arrival of the Portuguese
there was a highly developed Konkani literature, which was destroyed by
them. Fr Naik said this too is untrue. He said most of the inscriptions
of the time prior to the Portuguese arrival were written in Persian,
Sanskrit or Marathi.
Fr Naik said he had found not a single leaf in Konkani dating back to
those days. ?If the Portuguese had indeed destroyed all Konkani
manuscripts in the Old Conquests, then why was Konkani literature not
found in the New Conquests?? he asked.
Fearing conversions, Fr Naik stated that our forefathers from the Old
Conquests had moved heavy deities and heavy gold artefacts from the Old
Conquests to the New Conquest areas. ?If they could move all those
heavy articles, why did they not move relatively lighter manuscripts of
Konkani literature? It is because not much written Konkani literature
existed then,?he added.
Another myth demolished by Fr Naik was that in Goa, Konkani is taught
in most schools. Handing out copies of statistic (as on September 30,
2003) gleaned from the Directorate of Education, Fr Naik stated that
out of a total of 966 government primary schools in Goa, 918 offered
Marathi as the medium of instruction and only 79 offered Konkani as the
medium of instruction.--------------
Regards,
Carlos
