Linguist hopes to document words, phrases of the language in 2-4 years
By Anup Sharma
Author-linguist U.V. Jose receives the highest honour of the Tiwa society after the release of the book.
Guwahati, Dec 8 : The Tiwa language is set to have its first lexicon.
If all goes as planned, the community, which mainly inhabits the hills of Karbi Anglong and the plains of Morigaon and Kamrup districts, will have its first dictionary in the next two to four years.
U.V. Jose, a linguist and former principal of Don Bosco School in Karbi Anglong’s Umswai village, is taking up the Herculean task of documenting the language.
Jose, who hails from Kerala and has spent more than three decades spreading education in various parts of the Northeast, has just completed translating the New Testament into Tiwa. The book is titled Khubil Kodal, meaning good news in the language.
A French missionary, Rev. Fr. Michael Balawan, had first translated New Testament in Tiwa in 1982. He had learnt the language during his regular visits to Umswai from Nongphoh in Meghalaya’s Ri Bhoi district where he was the parish priest.
Jose says “Khubil Kodal is different as I have incorporated a lot of footnotes describing the historical background.”
The Tiwa community has about 1,70,000 members according to the 2001 census but experts believe that only 25,000 to 30,000 of them speak the language. Many of the community have adopted Assamese as their mother tongue and use it more than Tiwa.
“It is very important to document the language as Tiwa is a small community and most of its members have adopted Assamese as their mother tongue,” Jose said.
“There is a possibility that Tiwa might become an endangered language after a few years,” Jose told The Telegraph today.
He said he had started translating the New Testament about three years ago and took a sabbatical last year to complete it.
“I felt great working on Khubil Kodal. Tiwa is a rich language and little has been done to document it. Only a few books have been published in the language. The dictionary will document all the words and expressions of the language,” he said.
“Now I am planning to start the dictionary and will concentrate only on it till it is completed. I hope to complete it in two to four years. I have started the initial work and expect to compile about 10,000 words,” Jose said.
The community had made headlines in May this year when a Tiwa youth, Narayan Konwar, from remote Chamkata village in Assam’s Morigaon district, secured 119th position in the civil service examination conducted by the UPSC, becoming the first from the community to clear the exam.
via Telegraph
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