21st February is marked as International Mother Language Day, a day that gives the message of preserving languages across the world. Every species on this planet is born with a language, but humans are the only species that are born with structured languages, sharing rules and regulations within diverse cultures and multiple languages, as well as meaningful thoughts and messages with each other. However, chimpanzees also have a language, but their messages are not clear compared to humans’ language. Chimpanzees share a language full of gestures and are unable to tell specific stories, such as what they saw or what happened; they only inform other chimpanzees about dangerous prospects, such as a lion attacking or escaping. But the languages spoken by humans are very clear in speaking and understanding meaning—softer in convincing someone, and sweeter in listening to someone. These are the ways and characteristics of all languages.

Every culture has its own language with its own richness. The Balochi language has three widely spoken dialects, including Makrani, Sulemani, and Rakhshani. The Sulemani dialect is spoken in areas such as Dera Bugti, DG Khan, Sindh, and Koh-e-Suleman. While other parts of Balochistan speak Brahvi, Makrani, and Rakhshani. The people of Sindh speak the Sindhi language, a language that has a melodious voice. However, Sindh, despite being the land of diverse cultures, shares its common language, Sindhi, with all, even in its course curriculum from primary to intermediate. Today, many people from diverse backgrounds in Sindh speak the Sindhi language. The Balochs in Sindh, who have been living there for decades, are also able to speak the Sindhi language alongside their mother tongue, Balochi, which they use at home. It is very common for a Baloch to speak multiple languages at once. I myself, as a Baloch, speak four languages at once, including Sindhi, Saraiki, Balochi, and Urdu.

Additionally, when it comes to Punjab, we find varied rumours about the people of Punjab. Some say that in Punjab, Punjabi speakers are more likely to shift to speaking and prefer Urdu instead of Punjabi. As it is said, a language dies when its speakers die. However, Punjabi speakers are large in number and are spread across the country, yet gradually their language is being transformed from Punjabi. The reason for this must be justified, whether due to shifts in urban areas, their language is being subjected to change, or whether Urdu has more prestige than Punjabi for them. According to some estimates, there is a language in GB that has only three speakers left, and soon those speakers may die, which will cause the death of the language. According to UNESCO and linguistic experts, roughly one language dies across the world every two weeks. We have around 7,000 languages, of which 40 per cent are endangered.

What will happen if, at this pace, languages continue dying across the world? For language shift, we cannot directly attribute it to shifts from rural areas to urban ones, because many people in Pakistan speak varied languages; thus, they themselves give prestige to one language over another, for example, giving prestige to English over Urdu. This mostly happens in educated families rather than uneducated ones. Indeed, history goes in the opposite direction. Educated people who were born to wary preservers of language are themselves shifting their language. Even now, they consider it inferior to speak their common language; sometimes, they even make mistakes in it. That is what we call language stigma. No language naturally has any stigma; stigmas, however, are human-generated. Thus, in the long run, this causes the death of a language.

After all, we should all preserve our languages, because cultures are represented by languages. Wherever there is a culture, there is a language. Traditional cultures, however, have traditional attire, but they must consider that the actual essence of culture lies in language, not in attire. Since languages are the primary means of representing cultures, traditional attire merely helps to beautify them.

Sadam HussainThe writer is a freelancer and an avid reader with a keen interest in history and literature.

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