In 1996, Sindhi was the 50th widely spoken language in the world. Very useful and impressive information. More than 20 million persons spoke Sindhi in 1996. It is about the same number of people as those who spoke Dutch, Thai and Yoruba. Sindhi language deserves to be preserved and developed. Just as Sindhi people deserve to be more developed and more prosperous.
More » http://www.photius.com/rankings/languages2.html
via – Sindhi e-lists/ e-groups, 28 Jan 2013.
In 1969, Shaheed Zulfikar Ali Bhutto addressed students at Liaquat Medical College, Jamshoro, Sindh. He was allowed to speak on the condition that he would not talk about politics. However, in his speech, he said being a political animal, he could not refrain from speaking on the subject. He said the following:
– If Shah Lateef were alive today, he would be behind the bars. For all his poetry is based on democratic ideas.
– One unit is an evil. Were Shah Bhitai alive today, he would oppose One Unit.
– A child’s education should be in his/her mother tongue. No doubt Urdu and Bengali are national languages, I feel and as a minister I tried that Sindhi children be educated in Sindh.
Via → Sindhi e-lists/ e-groups → Mohammad Ali Mahar → YouTube
The National Foreign Language Center (NFLC) at the University of Maryland is a research institute dedicated to promoting communication within the United States in languages other than English. We are currently working on a project that provides adult language learners with interactive online tools to reinforce their foreign language skills. We focus on less commonly taught languages. We are currently looking for several individuals to help us launch projects in the following languages (Parsio-Arabic script): Brahvi, Hindko (Southern), Punjabi (Western), Pothohari, Sindhi, Siraiki.
Minimum Requirements: Native, or near-native, proficiency in the target language
English proficiency: Ability to conduct Internet research and submit Word documents and/or audio files
Desired Qualifications: Knowledge of ILR scale of language proficiency
Specifically, we need educated native speakers of these languages (or individuals with equivalent proficiency levels) to review online activities and cultural notes for online foreign language learning modules for their native language using software we provide. In addition, we are looking for speakers to find authentic reading and audio passages, to record audio files, and to perform various editing tasks in these languages.
The work is part-time, contractual, and most of the work can be done from your home computer. All candidates must have permission to work in the United States.
If you are interested in working with us, or if you know a qualified candidate who would be interested in working with us, please contact the NFLC via email at recruitment@nflc.org. Submit your current resume and include the language(s) you speak in the subject line. Thank you!
Amy Menjivar
Program Coordinator, National Foreign Language Center
University of Maryland
amenjivar@nflc.org
Courtesy: Sindhi e-lists/ e-groups, 16 Sept 2011
by Dr Manzur Ejaz
– Sincere and honest lovers of a people’s Pakistan should learn something: teach the national languages in other provinces as soon as possible. Sindhi and Punjabi are sister languages and their teaching in both provinces will further the cause of unity.
In its annual convention in St Louis, Missouri, on July 2-3, the Sindhi Association of North America (SANA) proved that it is the only authentic community organisation of expatriate Pakistanis in the US and Canada. Though smaller in size than other dominant Pakistani ethnic groups living in North America, SANA delivers a genuine community gathering for all ages and genders to those whose roots are/were in the Sindhi homeland, culture and language. Being a rare secular Pakistani organisation, SANA is also unique in catering to Hindu Sindhis who live all across India as well. This way it provides a real platform for person-to-person contacts between two brothers, India and Pakistan, who have chosen to remain at odds for real or imaginary mutual fears.
In one of its main sessions on the current political conditions in Pakistan it was shown, maybe for the first time, that if people of different nationalities are encouraged and enabled to communicate in their own mother tongues, they come closer faster. On the contrary, if unity is sought through an enforced artificially created concept of a nation, based on religion and a national language spoken by a tiny minority, hostility, misunderstandings and mutual hatred develops. ….
Read more → WICHAAR.COM
Courtesy: Geo Tv (Capital talk with Hamid Mir, Haroon-ul-Rasheen and Nazir Laghari – 14th july 2011 part – 4)
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To read more about PPP and MQM → BBC urdu
– Language can unite – by Zubeida Mustafa
MORE than six decades after Partition, India and Pakistan continue to be locked in disputes which even take them to the brink of war.
It is difficult to believe that people who had lived side by side for centuries now refuse to recognise the commonalities in their culture and languages. Against this backdrop comes a breath of fresh air in the form of a new book that focuses on social harmony rather than cultural discord.
Dr Tariq Rahman, a professor of sociolinguistic history at the Quaid-i-Azam University, has published his 11th book titled From Hindi to Urdu: A Social and Political History (OUP) that should make many scholars sit up. Some have already challenged his findings. …
Read more: DAWN.COM
Computer scientists at the University at Buffalo and at Janya Inc. have developed the first software system that will allow for computational processing of documents in Urdu, Pakistan’s national language and one of the world’s five most-spoken languages.
– You Tube
by Dr. Masood Ashraf
The role of national languages in defining and articulating national identities is a hackneyed subject, but, somehow, the privileging of learning a sacred language has not been explored much in the debates on nationalism. In this brief article, I intend to draw attention to the rise of Arabic studies in Pakistan and its long-term consequences for the Pakistani public sphere.
In his 1983 book Imagined Communities, Benedict Anderson provides three major causes for the waning of the pre-national empires and the rise of modern nation-states. One of the reasons, according to Anderson, was the rise of vernacular languages in place of what were considered the sacred languages, Latin and Arabic included. I have long maintained that Anderson misses the point as he only looks at the official use of these languages and not about the symbolic aspects of their power. In case of Arabic, for example, while it never was the official language of Muslim India, it still remains a language that wields immense symbolic power. …
Read more : ViewPoint
NA bill proposes eight `national languages`
By Raja Asghar
ISLAMABAD: Pakistan will have up to eight national languages — not just Urdu — if a private bill introduced in the National Assembly on Tuesday without any government objection is passed by parliament as a constitutional amendment.
The introduction of the long-pending and potentially divisive bill came after the government said it had no objection to the process, but there was no immediate indication if the ruling Pakistan People`s Party (PPP) would actually back the draft, most of whose 22 authors are its members, with Nawab Mohammad Yusuf Talpur on the top of the list, along with some well-known members of the opposition Pakistan Muslim League-Q. …
Read more : DAWN
SINDHI & URDU are the most beautiful and melodious languages of South Asia (sub-continent). Please don’t let them die. Do learn Siraiki, Punjabi, Balochi, Pashto, Brohvi, English and other languages but keep Sindhi and Urdu along.
Sindhi is the language of Shah, Sachal, Sami, Ayaz, love, peace and tolerance and Urdu is the language of Khusro, Mir and Galib. Learning different languages are skills. Sindhi language, Sindhi literature and rich Sindhi heritage are a treasure not only for our coming generations but for the world too. It is the moral responsibility of all to protect and promote Sindhi language and Sindhi culture and keep it alive for the global peace.
Courtesy: Wichaar
Research has shown that the students proficient in their mother tongue are better equipped to learn other languages. Furthermore, it is apparent that the countries that used mother tongues as medium of education were better in augmenting and creating knowledge.
Continue reading Education in mother tongue – Dr Manzur Ejaz
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