“Whoring after English Gods”

Lovely title, isn’t it? Perfectly describes the English-speaking minority in India. Not my genius - alas! - but that of the poet R. Parthasarathy.  The relevance will become crystal further down.
This is a first … blogging in the space of two days. The reason for this (rather pointless) productivity is that I’m disturbed. I could of course ventilate with the spouse and the kid. But [...]

Giving gay its due

 There is this friend of mine who always introduces himself thus: ”I’m —– and I’m gay.” A ’straight’ acquaintance once asked him, ”If being gay is as natural as being straight, why do you have to announce it? I don’t tell the world I’m straight!” I have no idea what my friend said in response; the question was rhetorical anyway, [...]

How do you say “Please” in ‘Indian’?

One of my pet theories (and there are many, though this one is teacher’s pet!) is that there is really nothing truly pan-Indian. Paradoxically, when speaking of India or Indians you often need to make pan-Indian generalizations, take recourse to stereotypes. Because it’s easier to speak of stereotypes than of vast, individual differences, isn’t it?  Allow me to elaborate.
One of my favourite urban legends, [...]

Postscript (How Indian is my English?)

The number of e-mails the earlier post on Indian English prompted inspires this postscript. 
If speaking a language means speaking a culture, then what culture does Indian English reflect? Probably that of the elite, western-educated, upper classes.  Not very nice baggage for a language to be carrying, is it?! (This language-culture nexus, by the way, has its roots in the Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis.)
Indian [...]

How Indian is my English?

One of the questions that should bother (It doesn’t. At least, not strongly enough.)  those of us who speak English in India  is: What to do about Indian English? Pretend that we don’t speak it? Banish it as non-standard English? Study it the way one would a specimen in a zoology lab, or as a curiosity, taking care to immunize [...]