Deccani language
Deccani | |
---|---|
دکنی | |
Deccan | |
Region | South Asia Maharashtra Karnataka Telangana Andhra Pradesh Tamil Nadu Goa |
Ethnicity | Deccanis |
Standard forms | |
Dialects |
|
Perso-Arabic (Urdu alphabet) | |
Language codes | |
ISO 639-3 | – |
Glottolog | dakh1244 |
Deccani (دکنی, dekanī or دکھنی, dakhanī)
The official language of the Deccan Sultanates was
There are three primary dialects of Deccani Urdu spoken today: Hyderabadi Urdu, Mysore Urdu, and Madrasi Urdu. Hyderabadi Urdu is the closest of these dialects to Standard Urdu.[8]
The term "Deccani" and its variants are often used in two different contexts: a historical, obsolete one, referring to the medieval-era literary predecessor of Hindi-Urdu;[9][5] and an oral one, referring to the dialect spoken in many areas of the Deccan today.[10] Both contexts have intricate historical ties.
History
Origin
As a predecessor of modern
The
Growth
In the early 16th century, the Bahmani Sultanate splintered into the
The rulers themselves participated in these cultural developments.
Although the poets of this era were well-versed in Persian, they were characterised by a preference for indigenous cultures, and a drive to stay independent of esoteric language. As a result, the language they cultivated emphasised the Sanskritic roots of Deccani without overshadowing it, and borrowed from neighbouring languages (especially Marathi; Matthews states that Dravidian influence was much less[21]). In this regard, Shaheen and Shahid note that literary Deccani has historically been very close to spoken Deccani, unlike the northern tradition that has always exhibited diglossia.[22] Poet San'ati is a particular example of such conscious efforts to retain simplicity:[23]
Rakhīyā kām Sahnskrīt ké is mén bōl, |
I have restricted the use of Sanskrit words, |
As the language of court and culture, Persian nevertheless served as the model for poetic forms, and a good amount of Persian and Arabic vocabulary was present in the works of these writers. Hence Deccani attempted to strike a balance between Indian and Persian influences,[24][25] though it did always retain mutual intelligibility with the northern Dehlavi. This contributed to the cultivation of a distinct Deccani identity, separate from the rulers from the north; many poets proudly extolled the Deccan region and its culture.[26]
Hence, Deccani experienced cultivation into a literary language under the Sultanates, alongside its usage as a common vernacular. It also continued to be used by saints and Sufis for preaching. However, the Sultanates did not use Deccani for official purposes, preferring the prestige language Persian as well as regional languages like Marathi, Kannada, and Telugu.[27]
Decline
The Mughal conquest of the Deccan by Aurangzeb in the 17th century connected the southern regions of the subcontinent to the north, and introduced a hegemony of northern tastes. This began the decline of Deccani poetry, as literary patronage in the region decreased. The sociopolitical context of the period is reflected in Hashmi Bijapuri's poem, composed two years after the fall of Bijapur, in a time when many southern poets were pressured to change their language and style for patronage:[28]
Tujé chākrī kya tu apnīch bōl, |
Why bother about patrons, in your own words do state; |
The literary centres of the Deccan had been replaced by the capital of the Mughals, so poets migrated to Delhi for better opportunities. A notable example is that of
Phonology
Consonants
Labial | Dental/ Alveolar |
Retroflex | Post-alv./ Palatal |
Velar | Glottal | ||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Nasal | voiced | m | n
|
ɳ | ŋ | ||
breathy | mʱ | nʱ | |||||
Affricate
|
voiceless | p | t
|
ʈ | tʃ | k | |
aspirated | pʰ | tʰ | ʈʰ | tʃʰ | kʰ | ||
voiced | b | d
|
ɖ | dʒ | ɡ | ||
breathy | bʱ | dʱ | ɖʱ | dʒʱ | ɡʱ | ||
Fricative
|
voiceless | f | s | ʃ | x | h | |
voiced | z | ɣ | |||||
Tap
|
voiced | r
|
ɽ | ||||
breathy | rʱ | ||||||
Approximant | voiced | ʋ | l
|
ɭ | j | ||
breathy | ʋʱ | lʱ | jʱ |
- /h/ can be heard as either voiceless [h] or voiced [ɦ] across dialects.
- The /q/ of Urdu is merged with /x/.
Vowels
Front | Central | Back | |
---|---|---|---|
High
|
iː | uː | |
ɪ | ʊ | ||
Mid | e | ə | o |
Low
|
aː |
- /e, o/ can have lax allophones of [ɛ, ɔ] when preceding consonants in medial position.
- Diphthong sounds include /əi, əe, əu, əo/.[31]
- /əi/ can be heard as [æ] after /h/.
- /əu/ can be heard as [ɔː] in initial positions.[32]
Modern era
The term Deccani today is given to a Hindustani lect spoken natively by many Muslims from Telangana, Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka and Maharashtra (who are known as the Deccanis). It is considered to be the modern, spoken variety of the historical Deccani dialect, and inherits many features from it. The term Deccani distinguishes the lect from standard Urdu - however, it is commonly considered a "variety" of Urdu,[10] and often gets subsumed under this name, both by its own speakers and the official administration. The demise of the literary tradition has meant that Deccani uses standard Urdu as its formal register (i.e. for writing, news, education etc).[33]
Geographical distribution
Deccani speakers centre around Hyderabad, the capital of Telangana. Deccani is also spoken in many other urban areas of the Deccan region and Mumbai, especially those with large Muslim populations such as Aurangabad, Nanded, Akola, Amravati, Bijapur, Gulbarga, Mysore and Bangalore.[34] In addition to members of the Deccani community, some Hindu Rajputs and Marathas in the Deccan speak Deccani Urdu as well.[8]
Features
Deccani is characterised by the retention of medieval-era features from Hindustani's predecessor dialects, that have disappeared in today's Hindi-Urdu. It is also distinguished by grammar and vocabulary influences from Marathi, Kannada, and Telugu, due to its prolonged use as a lingua franca in the Deccan.[33] A non-exhaustive list of its unique features, compared with standard Urdu where possible:
Deccani | Standard Urdu equivalent | Notes |
---|---|---|
minje, tume (not used in Hyderabadi Urdu) | mujhe, tum | Pronouns: Singular first and second person. |
humna, tumna (not used in Hyderabadi Urdu) | humen, tumen | |
un, in, une, ine, | uss, iss | Pronouns: Singular third person. |
uno, unon | uss log/woh log | Pronouns: Plural third person. |
mereku, tereku (cognate with vernacular hindustani "mereko"
and "tereko") |
mujhko, tujhko | Possessives often used with postpositions (mera + ku, tera + ku; see Pronunciation section below for explanation of ku).
|
suffix -ān (logān, mardān) | -ān for some words (ladkiyān) and -ein, -on for others (auratein, mardon) | Used almost exclusively for nouns ending with a consonant. Standard Urdu does not have this restriction. |
apan (used in spoken Urdu as well) | hum log | Is third person but often used in first person too. |
suffix -ich (main idharich hoon) | hī (main idhar hī hoon) | Adds emphasis. Matthews comments that this is "probably from Marathi".[35] |
kaiku, ki (kaiku kiya) | kyon (kyon kiya) | |
po (main ghar po hoon) (not used in Hyderabadi Urdu) | par (main ghar par hoon) | Not an exclusive swap; both are used. |
suffix -ingā (kal jaingā, ab karingā) | -enge (kal jayenge, ab karenge) | Plural of future tense for second and third person. |
sangāt (Yusuf sangāt jao) | ke sāth (Yusuf ke sāth jao) | Not an exclusive swap; both are used. |
nakko (nakko karo) | (approximately) Mat, nahin (mat karo) | From Marathi.[36] |
kathey (āj chutti hai kathey) | Means "it seems" or "apparently". | |
sō (āp kharide sō ghar mere ku pasand hai) | This does not have a direct equivalent.
In standard Urdu, "jo" and "ko" are used for the same effect.[37] (vahan jo log baithe hain, unko main nahi jāntā) |
Roughly means "which/that". "āp kharide sō ghar", the house that you bought. "bade kamre me tha sō kitābān", the books that were in the big room. |
jāko, dhoko, āko | jāke/jākar, dhoke/dhokar/, āke/ākar | Not an exclusive swap; ko, ke, and kar are all used. |
Pronunciation | ||
ku (Salim ku dedhey) | ko (Salim ko dedhey) | |
jātein, khāraun, ārein, kān | jāte hain, khā raha hoon, ā rahe hain,
kahān |
Deccani drops the intervocallic 'h'. Given examples are illustrative and non-exhaustive.
The Karachi dialect of Urdu also sometimes drops "h" sounds in order to communicate faster. |
kh ( خ )
|
q ( ق )
|
Deccani speakers tend to pronounce q as kh. e.g. Khuli Khutub Shah instead of Quli Qutub Shah. |
Sources:[38][37] |
These features are used to different degrees among speakers, as there tends to be regional variation. Mustafa names some varieties of Deccani as "(Telugu) Dakkhini, Kannada Dakkhini, and Tamil Dakkhini", based on their influence from the dominant Dravidian language in the spoken region. He further divides Telugu Deccani into two linguistic categories, corresponding to: Andhra Pradesh, which he says has more Telugu influence; and Telangana, with more influence from standard Urdu. The latter is seen especially in Hyderabadi Urdu.[39]
Deccani's use of Urdu as a standard register, and contact with Hindustani (widespread in India), has led to some of its distinctive features disappearing. Hence many of the features in the above table are used side-by-side with those of Standard Urdu.[40]
Culture
Deccani finds a cultural core in and around Hyderabad, where the highest concentration of speakers are; Telangana is one of the only four states of India to provide "Urdu" official status. Deccani Urdu in Hyderabad has found a vehicle of expression through humour and wit, which manifests in events called "
Buzdil hai woh jo jeetey ji marne se darr gaya |
It's a coward who fears death while still alive, |
— Ghouse Khamakha
|
Additionally, the Deccani Film Industry is based in Hyderabad, and its movies are produced in Hyderabadi Urdu.[44]
Legacy
Hindustani
Deccani is often considered a predecessor of Hindustani. The Deccani literary tradition is largely responsible for the development of modern Hindustani since contact with southern poets led to a shift in northern tastes and the development of Urdu as a literary language.[14] Deccani also imparted the practice of writing the local vernacular in the Perso-Arabic script, which eventually became the standard practice for Urdu all over the Indian subcontinent.[45]
See also
- Hyderabadi Urdu
- Urdu in Aurangabad
- Nawayathi (Kumta, Honnavar, Bhatkal)
- Deccani Muslims
- Deccani Film Industry
- Deccani Marathi, which goes by the same names
References
Notes
- ^ Deccani is spelled variously as Dakni, Dakhni, Dakhini, Dakkhani and Dakkani
Citations
- ISBN 978-0-87586-438-9.
- ISBN 978-1-351-39399-7.
- ^ Verma, Dinesh Chandra (1990). Social, Economic, and Cultural History of Bijapur. Idarah-i Adabiyat-i Delli. p. 141.
Deccani Hindi is indebted for its development to the Muslim poets and writers chiefly belonging to the kingdom of Bijapur.
- ^ Arun, Vidya Bhaskar (1961). A Comparative Phonology of Hindi and Panjabi. Panjabi Sahitya Akademi. p. xii.
The Deccani Hindi Poetry in its earlier phase was not so much Persianised as it became later.
- ^ a b c d Kama Maclean (26 September 2021). "Language and Cinema: Schisms in the Representation of Hyderabad". Retrieved 12 February 2024.
The Deccani language developed between the fourteenth and seventeenth centuries in the Deccan—it is known to be an old form of Hindi and Urdu. Deccani was influenced by the other languages of the region, that is, it borrowed some words from Telugu, Kannada and Marathi. Deccani was known as the language from the South and it later travelled to the north of India and influenced Khari Boli. It also had a significant influence on the development of Hindi and Urdu.
- ISBN 978-3-11-081950-2.
- ISBN 978-81-8475-971-6.
- ^ a b c "Urdu-Phonology and Morphology" (PDF).
- ^ Rahman 2011, p. 22.
- ^ a b Rahman 2011, p. 4.
- ^ a b Rahman 2011, p. 27.
- ^ a b Mustafa 2008, p. 185.
- ^ Dua 2012, p. 383.
- ^ a b c d Matthews, David. "Urdu". Encyclopaedia Iranica. Archived from the original on 29 April 2011.
- ^ A History of the Freedom Movement:Being the Story of Muslim Struggle for the Freedom of Hind-Pakistan, 1707-1947 · Volume 3, Issue 2. Pakistan Historical Society. 1957.
- ^ Schmidt, Ruth L. (1981). Dakhini Urdu : History and Structure. New Delhi. pp. 3 & 6.
{{cite book}}
: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link) - JSTOR 25165052– via JSTOR.
- ^ Shaheen & Shahid 2018, p. 100.
- ^ Shaheen & Shahid 2018, p. 124.
- ^ Matthews, David J. (1993). "Eighty Years of Dakani Scholarship". The Annual of Urdu Studies. 9: 92–93.
- ^ Matthews 1976, p. 170.
- ^ Shaheen & Shahid 2018, p. 116.
- ^ Shaheen & Shahid 2018, p. 101-103.
- ^ Shaheen & Shahid 2018, p. 103-104.
- ^ Matthews 1976, p. 283.
- ^ Shaheen & Shahid 2018, p. 106-108.
- ISBN 9780521254847.
- ^ Shaheen & Shahid 2018, p. 116 & 143.
- )
- ^ Shaheen & Shahid 2018, p. 118-119.
- ^ Mustafa, Khateeb S. (1985). A descriptive study of Dakhni Urdu as spoken in the Chittoor District, A. P. Aligarh: Aligarh Muslim University.
- ^ Schmidt, Ruth L. (1981). Dakhini Urdu : history and structure. Bahri, New Delhi.
- ^ a b Matthews 1976, p. 221-222.
- ^ Masica, Colin P. (1993). The Indo-Aryan Languages. Cambridge University Press. pp. 22 & 426.
- ^ Matthews 1976, p. 74.
- ^ Matthews 1976, p. 215.
- ^ ISBN 9780521299442.
- ^ Matthews 1976, p. 222-224.
- ^ Mustafa 2008, p. 186.
- ^ Matthews 1976, p. 179.
- )
- ^ "Ghouse Khamakhan (Part 1): Dakhani Mazahiya Mushaira". YouTube. Siasat Daily. Archived from the original on 12 December 2021.
- ^ "A Tongue Tied: The Story of Dakhani". Archived from the original on 6 April 2009.
- ^ Mumtaz, Roase. "Deccanwood: An Indian film industry taking on Bollywood". www.aljazeera.com. Retrieved 23 February 2018.
- ^ Dua 2012, pp. 383–384.
Bibliography
- Dua, Hans R. (2012), "Hindi-Urdu as a pluricentric language", in Michael Clyne (ed.), Pluricentric Languages: Differing Norms in Different Nations, Walter de Gruyter, ISBN 978-3-11-088814-0
- ISBN 978-0-19-906313-0, archived from the original(PDF) on 10 October 2014
- Mustafa, K.S (2008), "Dakkhni", in Prakāśaṃ, Vennelakaṇṭi (ed.), Encyclopaedia of the Linguistic Sciences: Issues and Theories, Allied Publishers, pp. 185–186, ISBN 978-1139465502
- Shaheen, Shagufta; Shahid, Sajjad (2018), Azam, Kousar J (ed.), "The Unique Literary Traditions of Dakhnī", Languages and Literary Cultures in Hyderabad, Routledge, ISBN 9781351393997
- Sharma, Ram (1964), दक्खिनी हिन्दी का उद्भव और विकास (PDF) (in Hindi), Allahabad: Hindi Sahitya Sammelan
- Matthews, David J. (1976). Dakani Language and Literature (Thesis). SOAS University of London.
Further reading
- Gricourt, Marguerite (2015). "Dakhinī Urdū". In Fleet, Kate; Krämer, Gudrun; Matringe, Denis; Nawas, John; Rowson, Everett (eds.). Encyclopaedia of Islam (3rd ed.). Brill Online. ISSN 1873-9830.
- Urban culture of Medieval Deccan (1300 AD-1650 AD)
- Bulletin of the Deccan College Post-Graduate and Research Institute, Volume 22 (1963)
- Deccani Painting by Mark Zebrowski
- Mohammed Abdul Muid Khan (1963). "The Arabian Poets of Golconda". Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society. 96 (2). Bombay University: 137–138. S2CID 163860407.