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The 21st of February is International Mother Language Day – the most celebrated day worldwide for languages. Grimly, this day also poses a strange paradox – a day that reminds us of the many languages which didn’t make it. Because even as we speak, we lose a language. Even as we celebrate, we lose a language. Research shows that we lose a language around the world, nearly every fourteen days. This paradox eludes and endangers language resources. Indigenous languages are, particularly, more threatened with extinction.
What precipitates this extinction? Why do people stop using them? In relation to the many lost indigenous languages, I draw my example from the lost Aboriginal languages: the languages of Australia’s first nation.
The Aboriginal culture is the oldest living culture in the world which dates back nearly eighty-thousand years. There are over three hundred Aboriginal languages belonging to an estimated twenty-eight language families and isolates. Sadly, many of these languages are lost today. As linguist Margaret Florey comments when asked about the disappearance of Aboriginal languages: “There were probably at least 250 languages at the time of colonisation. Now some of those languages have completely disappeared because of the processes associated with colonisation.”
One of those processes is the tainted history of the stolen generation. In a bid to eradicate the skin colour and the culture of this first nation, children were taken systematically from their mothers and placed in white families. Their languages were not encouraged to be spoken and the culture was slowly forgotten; while the colour of their skin was lightened through intermarriages. Only the English language and the European culture were allowed to prevail. Such cultural and language hegemony gradually led to the eradication of the languages.
Bangla, the focus of this essay, was also in the line of fire. It would have been lost too, had it not been for the nation’s sacrifice, because Urdu was declared the national language of Pakistan. The speakers of Bangla felt threatened as this declaration paved the way for Urdu to become the dominant language. Bangladesh was formerly East Pakistan and, more importantly, the speakers of Bangla from East Pakistan, currently Bangladesh, constituted the majority. Rightly Bangla, if any language, should have been deemed as the national language, not Urdu.
Hence a language movement was started to preserve Bangla. The 21st of February 1952, marks the beginning of that movement and is observed as an auspicious historical moment. Let us never forget that on this day many sacrificed to save Bangla and to make Bangla the national language instead of Urdu. This was an incredible instance in world history in which the Bangladeshi nation was willing to die for the love of their language. A formal note was made recognizing what the Bangladeshi people did, the French Quebec cited this example when they were trying to break the English hegemony to carve out a place for the French language in Canada.
The French Canadians, however, did not succeed as the Bangladeshi people had in reinstating the French language as the lingua franca. Canada remains a bilingual country where the French language is dominant only in Quebec. However, in Bangladesh, the language movement created momentum in the lead up to independence, into the creation of a nation that takes pride today in Bangla being the national language – a feat achieved through struggle and sacrifice.
This year, as I commemorated this occasion of the Ekushay, meaning 21st, I revisited a time when I was growing up in Dhaka after the independence. I went to a music school, BAFA, to learn Tagore songs under the tutelage of renowned Tagore singers and teachers such as Atiqur Rahman and his wife Hamida Atique. Every Ekushay, we would have a whole night of music on BAFA show-grounds where people would jostle through the night by the hundreds to watch these functions composed of beautiful dances and songs – Aguner porosh moni choya o prane, a jibon punno koro (Let there be a touch of fire to purify life and soul) – a group dance choreographed holding candles on each of the dancer’s palms illuminating midnight, without any deterrents from electricity or hurricane lamps. A most magical moment, created by the palmed candlelights on stage. It was a touching song too, and meaningful to the many martyrs as though they too had been touched by the fire of enlightenment with the movement coming to fruition.
A traditional march to the martyr monument to pay respect to the martyrs ensued – a long march to the Shahid Minaar, with torches and candles burning nearly until dawn, another magical moment to remember. More dances and songs were performed at the monument until sunrise when this solemn march was broken.
With each passing day, relevant research into the language movement reveals and adds new dimension to the language movement, where I fail as an expat with nothing much to offer except my reminiscences. However, what really matters is the respect for the movement I have always had burning like the Olympian torch. I am thankful to our martyrs who restored our Bangla from extinction. Today, the movement has grown into an international language day. Hopefully this article can help the world understand the sacrifice some have made to keep languages alive and the respect we should have for all the world’s languages.
About Mehreen Ahmed
Multiple contests winner for short fiction, Mehreen Ahmed is an award-winning Australian novelist born in Bangladesh.Her historical fiction, The Pacifist is an audible bestseller.Included in The Best Asian Speculative Fiction Anthology,her works have also been acclaimed by Midwest Book Review,and DD Magazine,Translated into German, Greek, and Bangla,her works have been reprinted,anthologized,selected as Editor's Pick, Best ofs,and made the top 10 reads multiple times.Additionally,her works have been nominated for Pushcart,botN and James Tait.She has authored eight books and has been twice a reader and juror for international awards. Publications/Forthcoming Cambridge University Press,University of Hawaii Press,Michigan State University Press,Perception Magazine:Syracuse University,Straylight Magazine:Wisconsin-Parkland University,The Talon Review:North Florida Univeristy,ISTE,Call-ej,University of Kent Press,The Sheaf:University of Saskatoon,Jimson Weed UVA,Writer's Digest:Six Sentences,IceFloe Press,Litro Magazine,Bull,Otoliths,BeZine,Atherton Review,Ethel Zine,Olney Magazine,Alternate Route,The Gorko Gazette,Minison Project-Shakespear's sonnet reimagined,WordCityLit,Mōtus Audāx Press,KNOT Magazine,The Antonym,Insignia 2022 Best Asian Speculative Fiction Anthology,The Hennepin Review,Literary Heist,Mad Swirl,Alien Buddha Press,Rogue Agent Journal:Sundress Publications,October Hill Magazine,Synchronised Chaos,Oddball Magazine,Pine Cone Review,Noctivagant Press,Coin-Operated Press,Connotation Press,Door is A Jar,ELJ Scissors and Spackle,The Chamber Magazine,Flash Boulevard,Five Minutes,Quail Bell,Ponder Savant,Litterateur RW,ShabdAaweg Review,Phenomenal Literature,Crêpe & Penn,Flash Frontier,Ellipsis Zine,Ginosko#24#29,Brown Bag,The Cabinet of Heed,Sequoyah Cherokee River Journal,Melbourne Culture Corner,Cogito Literary Journal,Literati Magazine,Active Muse,Dreaming in Fiction,Anti-Heroin Chic,Love in the time of Covid Chronicle,Unpublished Platform,Wellington Street Review,Nailpolish Stories,Setu,Impspired Magazine,The Writers and Readers'Magazine,Empyrean Literary Magazine,WINK,Mono,KREAXXXION Review,Thorn Literary Magazine,3 Moon Magazine,Merak Magazine,Sage Cigarettes,All Existing,The Bombay Review,FlashBack Fiction,Down in the Dirt,CC&D,Nymphs,Portand Metrozine,Academy of Heart and Mind,Mojave Heart,The Piker Press,Kitaab,Nthanda,CommuterLit,Angel City Review,Paper Djinn,FreeFlashFiction,Cafe Dissensus,Adelaide Literary Magazine,Scarlet Leaf Review,Terror House Magazine,The Punch Magazine,Furtive Dalliance,Flash Fiction North,Bridge House,Cosmic Teapot,The Hooghly Review,The Chakker and more. Awards/Accolades Drunken Druid's Editor's Choice,2017/The Pacifist Nom James Tait Black Prize for fiction,2021/Gatherings First Place Academy of the Heart and Mind,May Flowers contest 2022/The Phases of the Moon One of the winners,Waterloo Festival,May 2020/Dolly Stream-of-Consciousness Challenge,Cabinet-of-Heed,Drawer Four,April 2020/Black Mirror Finalist,Fourth Adelaide Literary Award contest,February 2020/Flower Girl Honourable Mention in the Weavers of Words contest,Unpublished Platform,March 2022/Silent Bleat Winner Shout Reader Ready Silver, Bronze Awards for fiction 2019/The Pacifist, Moirae,The Blotted Line Nom,Publication of the Month,Spillwords Press April/May 2018/Waheed Murad 3xNom, botN 2020/ Interlude,Lungs,Ylem Nom,Pushcart,2020/Ylem/republished in Ginosko#24 Writer's Choice Best of CafeLit 8 2019/Bats Downunder Best of Mad Swirl twice 2023/Space,Vape Best of Alien Buddha 2023/ Deep well Editor's Pick Kitaab 2023/The Giver Editor's Pick Litro 2023/Sensible Shoes Audiobooks The Pacifist2017 Peeking Cat Literary/Chasing a Dream2021 SweetyCat Press/Rain and Coffee2020 FlashBackFiction/East Bengal 1971,2020 Shortstoryreader/Juliet's Song2021 Flash Fiction Frontier/Blue,Grey,Lavender2020 The Archer/Jingwei2022
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