Principal Message
Ladies and gentleman, in the capacity of the Principal of School of Language, Arts and Culture, I am honored to write a few words in my message about Hindi Language.
Mother Language is defined as ones native language. Hindi language is the Mother Language for the Indian Community in India, Australia and all other countries where Indians have migrated to. Hindi Language was developed in India and is an off-shoot of the Sanskrit Language. According to the Macquarie Dictionary, Sanskrit Language is the ancient classical literary language of India. It developed in India thousands of years ago.
The Hindi language is extremely structured, containing 52 alphabets, 12 vowels and 40 consonants. It uses gender based nouns and verbs and is highly precise in application. Like English, Hindi is written from left to right. It uses the Devnagri script which is an ancient script dating from 1st Century CE. This script is used in over 120 languages, making it one of the most used and adopted writing systems in the world.
Hindi became the official language of the Republic of India on 15th August, 1947 when India gained its independence from British. Today Hindi is the world’s third most spoken language and is the mother tongue of over 500 million people.
The process of globalization such as trade, politics, defense, entertainment, sports and the like have positively impacted on the pedagogy of Hindi Language in Australia and abroad. With liberalized economy and opening of the Indian frontiers to the world market, there is increased interest in learning and teaching of Hindi Language.
Now, let us take our focus to define the value of the Hindi language for the Indian people, especially those who have migrated from India.
By speaking in Hindi, Indian people are able to feel a sense of inclusion within their community. It helps to protect them from isolation and creates an awareness and sense of belonging to a wider community thus providing the basic support structures enabling settlement for Indian migrants. It creates opportunities that promote understanding and contribute positively to the mental and emotional wellbeing of millions of Indian immigrants worldwide. It encourages effective communication and creative expressions that are not limited by the boundaries of another language that may be foreign to the heart.
Learning the Hindi language would also help reduce the generation gap between the younger and the older generations of migrated Indians. It would provide a tool to help facilitate a better understanding between the young and the old, regenerating family bonds that are valued over everything else by a traditional Indian family. This presents an undisputed case for the positive influences of our mother tongue, the Hindi language on our present and future generations.
In the words of Nelson Mandela, I quote, ‘’If you talk to a man in a language he understands, it goes to his head. If you talk to him in his language, it goes to his heart.
Ganga Singh
Principal
School of Language, Arts and Culture.