Next: Missionary activity on behalf
Up: Language and Colonialism
Previous: Language and Colonialism
The discovery by Sir William Jones and other orientalists that Sanskrit was
probably related to European languages, but in a genetic relationship that
involved descent from a common source that `perhaps no longer exist[ed]'
certainly changed the `Orientalist' equation, no matter what critics of
Orientalism might say. Sanskrit became a language that was no longer
inherently exotic or `oriental', but a language with deep affinities with
European classical and modern languages. It became a sister language,
rather than a subaltern language, and its `discovery' had direct impetus for
the development of historical and comparative linguistics, and modern
linguistics in general. It spurred inquiry into the genetic relationships of
the daughter (and `grand-daughter') languages of Sanskrit by scholars and
missionary-grammarians of all sorts, which perhaps raised as many questions as
it solved. It encouraged efforts to standardize and modernize Indian
vernaculars for use in the administration of the East India Company (and
post-Mutiny, of British India), and it legitimized the status and aspirations
of certain languages and discouraged the hopes of others, as linguists were
forced to make decisions of various sorts about what were `real' languages and
what were `mere dialects'.
One must not assume, however, that the `Orientalists' (now much reviled by
critics from post-modern and subaltern studies) were to carry the day on
language policy in India. Though Jones and others praised Sanskrit for its
``wonderful structure, more perfect than the Greek, more copious than
the Latin, and more exquisitely refined than either" (de Bary et al.
1958(2):38) these sentiments were not shared by the Anglicists who came later.
Next: Missionary activity on behalf
Up: Language and Colonialism
Previous: Language and Colonialism
Harold Schiffman
12/8/2000