61–70 of 78 posts
we named our dog "santosha", such a great word.
Unlike in the West, naming one's dog after someone's name is considered an insult. "I will have a pet dog named after you" is insult thrown in fights. So, Indians name their dogs uncommon among humans. Or they have foreign names like Johnny, Jack, etc.
we named our dog "santosha", such a great word.
Don't tell that to Indians! A lot of humans are named "Santosh". :x Unlike in the West, naming one's dog after someone's name is considered an insult. "I will have a pet dog named after you" is insult thrown in fights. So, Indians name their dogs uncommon among humans. Or they have foreign names like Johnny, Jack, etc.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Sanskrit was widely spoken and understood just like Latin or Avestan, in its heyday. Otherwise it wouldn’t be part of the liturgical traditions of Buddhism, Jainism and Nastika traditions. I think, and it is just my speculation, that for most of Indian History, Sanskrit was the link language. Just like "Latin" in the USA and Europe of the early 17th and 18th centuries, when all academic instructions were carried ou…
> I think, and it is just my speculation, that for most of Indian History, Sanskrit was the link language. > Just like "Latin" in the USA and Europe of the early 17th and 18th centuries, when all academic instructions were carried out in Latin! You're suggesting that Sanskrit became a scholarly language, which no one was disputing. You're even using as a metaphor Latin, which started out as a vulgate tongue - which i…
I gave a specific example where neither the coffee wholesaler nor the buyer probably operates day to day in English. But they would still use English for the official agreement.
That does not take away from other benefits of English like being spoken by millions as a primary language and probably billions as a second language
>According to Tripathi, the problem of Sanskrit being narrowed to religion is a colonial inheritance. British Orientalists, he argues, created an image of Sanskrit as the language of ritual and one religious community, ignoring its vast Buddhist, Jain, Carvaka, scientific, theatrical, poetic and philosophical corpus. I don't understand how you can take what happened to AH Dani at BHU and say this with a straight fac…
>According to Tripathi, the problem of Sanskrit being narrowed to religion is a colonial inheritance. British Orientalists, he argues, created an image of Sanskrit as the language of ritual and one religious community, ignoring its vast Buddhist, Jain, Carvaka, scientific, theatrical, poetic and philosophical corpus. I don't understand how you can take what happened to AH Dani at BHU and say this with a straight fac…
Let's go a bit back and try to understand what happened with Buddhists of India. A whole religion exterminated from such a vast land.
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The majority of surviving Sanskrit literature is actually secular like Poems, Dramas, science and mathematics. Sanskrit was widely spoken and understood just like Latin or Avestan, in its heyday. Otherwise it wouldn’t be part of the liturgical traditions of Buddhism, Jainism and Nastika traditions. Why would Sudraka,Vatsayana, Brhathari write in Sanskrit if no one spoke it?
> Sanskrit was widely spoken and understood just like Latin or Avestan Is that so ? I am not knowledgeable myself but some of my family members are (professor s in Sanskrit) and from what I have absorbed from their conversation is in direct contradiction to your claim. The language of interpersonal communication were vulgarised forms, aka the vernacular languages. Sanskrit was used were a need for formality, respect,…
Diglossia is very common in Indian culture and it is not far fetched to imagine Indians speaking Sanskrit and Prakrits fluently and switching them based on context.
You can find minor examples of it even today if you look at public announcements, which are done in Sanskrit inspired verbiage.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
The majority of surviving Sanskrit literature is actually secular like Poems, Dramas, science and mathematics. Sanskrit was widely spoken and understood just like Latin or Avestan, in its heyday. Otherwise it wouldn’t be part of the liturgical traditions of Buddhism, Jainism and Nastika traditions. Why would Sudraka,Vatsayana, Brhathari write in Sanskrit if no one spoke it?
> Sanskrit was widely spoken and understood just like Latin or Avestan, in its heyday. Otherwise it wouldn’t be part of the liturgical traditions of Buddhism, Jainism and Nastika traditions. I think, and it is just my speculation, that for most of Indian History, Sanskrit was the link language. Just like "Latin" in the USA and Europe of the early 17th and 18th centuries, when all academic instructions were carried ou…
Sanskrit enjoyed scholarship since 6th BCE and it was prevalent and commonly used for more than a millennia after that.
The various inscriptions found across the subcontinent, and meant for common people are in Sanskrit which disproves this idea that it was not widely used.
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Let's go a bit back and try to understand what happened with Buddhists of India. A whole religion exterminated from such a vast land.
You might find my following earlier interaction with "selimthegrim" on this topic interesting - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41526431
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You might find my following earlier interaction with "selimthegrim" on this topic interesting - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41526431
You brought citations and so did I. There is no reason for animus. And I was talking about what happened to Ahmad Hasan Dani this time.
And I pointed out that you were again being dishonest with your selective quoting - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48930068
PS: As for our previous interactions which i pointed to, you did not provide citations but merely selective quoting which i had forcefully called out. People can read the chain of comments and judge for themselves.
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You brought citations and so did I. There is no reason for animus. And I was talking about what happened to Ahmad Hasan Dani this time.
> And I was talking about what happened to Ahmad Hasan Dani this time. And I pointed out that you were again being dishonest with your selective quoting - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48930068 PS: As for our previous interactions which i pointed to, you did not provide citations but merely selective quoting which i had forcefully called out. People can read the chain of comments and judge for themselves.