Dear Floriano, Again, to disagree....
Konkani did not get a "bad deal for 450 years of Portuguee rule".
However inconvenient it might be to admit this, there were some phases
of Portuguese rule which were helpful to Konkani. The vast literature
created in the Romi script is a pointer to this. (Of course, some might
feel today that the Romi script was a diversion *away* from the real
Konkani, but that is another point.)
Saraswat Hindu support for Konkani seems to be a post-20th century
phenomenon, largely. Like the Catholics, who support the language for
reasons other than linguistic (in my view), the Saraswat Hindus also
have complex reasons for their support to the language.
Please see something I had written on language politics in Goa:
http://www.mail-archive.com/goanet-n...@lists.goanet.org/msg00067.html
Obviously, there's more than meets the eye. FN
floriano wrote:
Rico,
I appreciate your inputs. However, Konkani got the bad deal for 450
years of the Portuguese rule. At the same time, Marathi was something
else.
How that happened if Konkani was at the heart of Goan Saraswats, I fail
to understand. Either the numbers were ignorable or nobody cared enough.
It is a fact that Konkani is much alive in the Hindu world because of
Saraswats, perhaps.
When I wrote below, I was talking of the overview from the mainstream
Hindu point of view, which cannot be denied.
Konkani is the lingua franca and/or most widely sponken language of Goa
enough with the die-hard Marathi protagonists, Marathi being the
literary and the religious language. Why Konkani suffered so badly is
the question that perplexes me.
