July 18, 2006
"But I Warn You, They Are Not As Peaceful As Me"Film
Community leaders from Tower Hamlets, London have started a campaign against the filming of Monica Ali’s 2003 novel Brick Lane. The novel was shortlisted for the Booker Prize, and was a big commercial and critical success. Reactions by many South Asian readers I heard from were mixed, mainly because of Ali’s use of a kind of pidgin English in the letters from the main character’s sister in Bangladesh, Hasina. (Our blog-friend DesiDancer also had a succinct review: “utter crap”, were her delicate, carefully chosen words)
Of course, the quality of the book is mostly irrelevant to the censorship campaign under way. This campaign seems to be an extension of the campaign against the book itself in 2003, and includes some of the same players and the same sad rhetoric of outrage and offense that is routinely trotted out these days in response to something or other:
In an echo of the controversy which surrounded the initial publication of the book, set partly in the east London borough, the novel is accused of reinforcing “pro-racist, anti-social stereotypes” and of containing “a most explicit, politically calculated violation of the human rights of the community”.
Community leaders attacked the book on its publication in 2003, claiming that it portrayed Bangladeshis living in the area as backward, uneducated and unsophisticated, and that this amounted to a “despicable insult”. (link)
The misguided attempt to protect the community’s honor through censorship will be ineffective, and the censorship campaign itself has the ironic effect of making the community look really, really bad.
The leader of the campaign is making an only thinly-veiled threat of violence if film cameras are brought to Brick Lane:
He brushed aside suggestions that a work of fiction couldn’t be seen as an attack on a community. “It’s not a fiction book,” he explained. “This is all lies. She wanted to be famous at the cost of a community.”
He also claimed that community groups prevented Monica Ali from being awarded the Booker prize. “This book was contesting for the Booker prize,” he said. “We stopped that.”
Mr Salique raised the spectre of a worsening in community relations if filming goes ahead on location. “We are living in a multicultural society,” he said. “We are in a peaceful situation. This film will make a lot of problems for local people.”
He threatened mass protests if the company attempts to film on the streets of Tower Hamlets, saying that “the community feels strongly about this. We are not going to let it happen.
“Young people are getting very involved with this campaign. They will blockade the area and guard our streets. Of course, they will not do anything unless we tell them to, but I warn you they are not as peaceful as me.” (link)
I love the part where he says, “this is not a fiction book … It’s all lies.” Speaks for itself, donnit? And “I warn you they are not as peaceful as me” is a really ominous, nasty little threat, which I hope the filmmakers will ignore.
Here’s a paragraph from the novel itself describing the physical space of Brick Lane in London. Does it really merit this kind of censorship campaign?
A horn blared like an ancient muezzin ululating painfully, stretching his vocal cords to the limit. She stopped and the car swerved. Another car skidded to a halt in front of her and the driver got out and began to shout. She ran again and turned into a side street, then off again to the right onto Brick Lane. She had been here a few times with Chanu, later in the day when the restaurants smelled of fresh boiled rice and old fried fat and the waiters with their tight black pants stood in doorways holding out menus and smiles. But now the waiters were at home asleep, or awake being waited on themselves by wives who only served and were not served in return except with board and lodging and the provision of children whom they also, naturally, waited upon. And the streets were stacked with rubbish, entire kingdoms of rubbish piled high as fortresses with only the border skirmishes of plastic bottles and grease-stained cardboard to separate them. A man looked up at some scaffolding with an intent, almost ardent, expression as if his love might be at the top, cowering on the high planks or the dark slate roof. A pair of schoolchildren, pale as rice and loud as peacocks, cut over the road and hurtled down a side street, galloping with joy or else with terror. Otherwise, Brick Lane was deserted. Nazneen stopped by some film posters pasted in waves over a metal siding. The hero and heroine peered at each other with epic hunger. The scarlet of her lips matched the bandanna tied around his forehad. A sprinkling of sweat highlighted the contour of his biceps. The kohl around her eyes made them smoke with passion. Some invisible force was keeping them (only inches) apart. The type at the foot of the poster said: The world could not stop their love. (Brick Lane, page 32)
Now, if I lived in Tower Hamlets or worked on Brick Lane I might not be happy about the piles of rubbish Ali describes (from my own experience visiting the place five years ago, I don’t remember any piles of rubbish, though I visited in the middle of the day). But why are people always so quick to find characterizations like these “offensive” or “insulting”? Is it really worth rioting over?
amardeep on July 18, 2006 10:05 AM in Fiction, Film, Issues, Literature, News · T·r·a·c·k·b·a·c·k address · Direct link · Email post
sure they did. I bet the fact that the book was slightly better than a Fabio-covered supermarket potboiler might have been part of why it didn't get the Booker. I cringe to think it would hold company with some of the previous Booker recipients.
Fabio? or FOBio? hmmmm.
Call it the L.A. in me, but if they do a blockade of the neighborhood, can't they film the movie in a studio or a film set? I mean, from what I recall of the book, it's not like the main character was dependent on a set that just had to film on location.
I thought the book was crap, but my mother loved it. Go figure. I'm sure her and all her friends will go watch the movie.
I think this whole campaign is ridiculous, and it always drives me mad to see the energy of organizing getting wasted on a campaign like this when there are more important things going on the world that could use this South Asian organzing energy. I'd be interested to hear from some of our "Asian" bros/sisters across the pond on what they have to say about the campaign...
Taz,
Yes, they definitely can. It won't look quite as good, but most of this story takes place indoors anyways, so I doubt it will matter very much. The bigger worry may be what happens when the film is released.
Community leaders attacked the book on its publication in 2003, claiming that it portrayed Bangladeshis living in the area as backward, uneducated and unsophisticated, and that this amounted to a despicable insult. (link)
and
The misguided attempt to protect the communitys honor through censorship will be ineffective, and the censorship campaign itself has the ironic effect of making the community look really, really bad.
QED? such behavior is disgusting and make america cautious of its own immigration policies.
Jesus. Was she tutored by Thomas Friedman or what? Yuck! They should be protesting over that being considered for a Booker at all. That first sentence is terrible.
From what I understand, the basic objection is to the fact that the heroine is married to a much older man (I'm assuming it's portrayed as a dysfunctional marriage -- I haven't read the book myself yet) and subsequently has an affair with a young guy.
I also believe that some younger Asians -- including British Bangladeshis -- think that the protestors' own actions (which seem to be dominated by older uncle types) actually make the Brick Lane/British Bangladeshi community look worse than the supposedly-objectional aspects of the novel itself.
I wonder if the people concerned realise that, as a self-fulfilling prophecy, by their own actions the second point risks actuallly proving the first point. They're hanging themselves with their own rope.
A few men in a ladoo shop on Brick Lane DO NOT represent anyone but themselves, and they certainly do not warrant being described as 'community leaders'. Your average Brit-Bangla couldnt care less about it. But the media needs controversy, and solitary men in backstreet shops want attention, and hey presto, people in America are worrying about them and they are famous.
Let's hope the movie is better than the novel.
A few men in a ladoo shop on Brick Lane DO NOT represent anyone but themselves, and they certainly do not warrant being described as 'community leaders'.
a multicultural society needs 'community leaders' because individuals are irrelevant, you are nothing but a cog in the ethnic machine, and that machine needs and executive control system.
i am reading a monograph right now on the assimilation of islamic groups into the russian empire in the late 18th and 19th centuries, and it is interesting to see how the empire legitimized and formalized heirarchies to generate 'community leaders' with whom it could negotiate. same thing is happening the west. people always bitch about the power imbalance with the white man, but the reality is that the more impactful tyrants are local.
Calm down Razib.
I repeat, a bunch of men in white vests in ladoo shops in Brick Lane are not 'community leaders'. When mischief is granted publicity it's so easy to make broad brush strokes about entire communities. Do you really believe that their 'outrage' is indicative or representative of Brit-Bengalis? There's an antidote to this - ignore them.
Here is the lowdown:
Seems to me that this whole episode shows how easy it is for a jumped up agitator NOBODY to get himself listened to in certain situations, and a media that is eager and gullible to jump on any half-wit to give them a sensationalist piece of news.
The man in the sweet shop is not the only person to blow things out of all proportion though, some people can scratch their chins and invoke the 18th Century Russian Empire into this proverbial storm in a teacup ;-)
good point, Taz. Surely a semi-convincing set could be faked, especially since only a small percentage of the potential viewing audience would actually know what the "real" Brick Lane looks like. -When the movie "Rent" came out last year, I had a friend ask me in which neighborhood of NYC they shot the song picturisation for "Last Year's Rent". They didn't; it was just a pretty good Lower East Side Generic Set Piece 147-152...
1) For prophet and tsar : Islam and empire in Russia and Central Asia / Robert D. Crews
2) pablo, brown ppl in the UK, especially muslims (i would say just muslims, but the sikh thuggishness and illiberality in relationship to the theater incident a few years back makes me have to throw the net wider), are messed up. a few dozen whackjobs can blow people up, oh, oops, they have. yes, the preponderance of the community isn't messed up, so what? revolutionary vanguards can cause a lot of problems....
The book was mediocre, but it has some wel-drwan male characters -- Chanu, Karim, Dr.Azad, and Razia's drug-addled son. Archetypes of Desi manhood in the west? Yep. How terribly pathetic.
I think I have to agree with Razib. Community leaders do matter, not only in setting the vibe for discourse in MSM but also within the community itself. Also the powers that be need "native informants," and community leaders are defacto liasons. If you disagree with them they should be contested, not ignored.
Razib, people know that 'revolutionary vanguards' as you put it are messed up. Does anybody dspute that? I don't see anyone doing so.
However, given the quotes above, of Brick Lane Bengalis saying that thousands of Bengalis in the area are involved in the production of the film, and support it, and dismiss the ramblings of a fat nincompoop who can't even squeeze twenty people into his hole in the wall, it would appear that Muslims in Brick Lane are not a monolithic breed. Simple point to grasp. OK you grasped it but wanted to make a wider point about how Muslims in Britain are singular devils. And 18th Century Russia. Got it. Well done!
desitude
Ummmm...these people are not community leaders. They are fat sweet sellers. Read the quotes above. They are not only being contested, they are being dismissed by the thousand and more Bengalis in Tower Hamlets involved in the film production, as well as local residents who either ignore or dont care about such a thing.
I bet there's a parallel with 18th Century Russia there somewhere.
Razib -- Have u read the book?
I hate to say this but desis when they choose to band together on any cause tend to emerge with too many chiefs and not enough Indians. If this mimics any of the local politics that took place thru the 90s on Oak Tree Road in Islin or 74th Street in Jackson Heights where the so called community leaders (small shop owners) tried to band together to gain power within the community, it will be a big ass failure.
The bickering and infighting over the position of the chief and what rules were to be made and the battles to be picked eventually split people up and caused more problems within the community. The 90s passed and in the past 5 years these very desis started moving out east...towards Nassau country. Pockets of desiness...Hicksville, Bellerose and they are still infighting, except they have bigger houses and better cars. They are still split, there is no unity or for that matter there exists general hostility among the locals they fail to mingle with and even among the 3 major groups of desis that live there, Malayalees, Gujjus and Punjabis. They don't even patronize the shops evenly.
20 years and to date they haven't been able to do so many of the basic changes (small exception Patel Bros in JH) that are desperately needed for the communities. Traffic/bus route control, security and crowd control, parking rules and above and beyond getting someone elected into the damn community boards! Nothing....
DesiDancer, Rent was actually shot in San Francisco...go figure!! I really didn't enjoy Brick Lane at all-- I just thought the writing was bad and the "woman stuck in bad marriage" theme was not expanded in a way that was compelling. Her characters became unidimensional and insipid. I wonder if the lack of depth will be transferred to the development of the characters in the screen play. Time will tell.
OK you grasped it but wanted to make a wider point about how Muslims in Britain are singular devils.
not singular.
ikram, half way through.
This always happens. I met with a few "community leaders" in Coney Island a few years ago and each of them had some choice comments about the other ones. In the Queens Indian bong circuit that i grew up in, there are at least 3 pujas--not counting the other one in Nassau county or the ones in New Jersey. Desi NGOs routinely have conflicts--NYTWA alliance emerged from CAAAV (which is pan-Asian, as far as I know); Workers Awaaz split from Sakhi and later Andolan split from Workers' awaaz. The South Asian Lesbian and Gay Association had a big, traumatizing fight when a few members left to start a for-profit queer desi party company. There are other examples, obviously.
It's people and politics and power, yo--it's not the end of the world unless it turns personal and vitriolic and people place their own personal interests (esp. ego and power) above and beyond community work. The key, I would guess, is to manage these things effectively.
Incidentally, I decided not to read the book and am curious as to whether the OTHER aspect of Brick Lane that I noticed (about 4 years ago) got any mention--that it's a clubbing district, replete with a ton of postering and whatnot, at night. That desis are driving the taxis (sometimes gypsy cabs) that are taking these pan-ethnic but likely mostly White partiers home.
It's something of a mindf$ck when you go to a neighborhood in the daytime and it's a working class bong neighborhood and you go at night to party. But I suppose that's only because I'm not a Latino in the Lower East Side of New York or some such thing that the disjoint was stark.
Yeah but when you are less than 2% of the pop you end up losing respect of the rest of the 98% and getting anything done is impossible. Hell I was a Netip officer for 10 minutes before I resigned because I couldn't deal with the fucking powertripping. Desis are full of themselves unfortunately when it comes to trying to support eachother. Everyone wants to be the President!
I compare the desis with simple lack of crowd/traffic/bus route/parking control or for that matter interest in JH after having economic power there for 20 years to those that wanted to change the rules/laws/lanes/traffic on Queens Blvd about 4 years ago when the death toll was so high. I worked with them and found little to no power tripping going on. That group was successful in changing the whole fabric of Queens with the changes to Queens Blvd. So I know it is possible I just think desis are a serious failure at this kind of organization with focus for the greater good.
Janeofalltrades,
"If this mimics any of the local politics that took place thru the 90s on Oak Tree Road in Islin or 74th Street in Jackson Heights where the so called community leaders (small shop owners) tried to band together to gain power within the community, it will be a big ass failure."
Hopefully this censorship movement will be a failure. This is such a crazy thing to get upset about. If a book is offensive, the movie will censor itself, as I learned after my attempts to organize mass protests against the Mistress of Spices on ethical grounds didn't quite pan out :)
And what was with those letters in the book? Since they were obviously a translation, was it that the sister didn't really know how to speak Bengali and that's why they translated to bad English? You would think an editor could have pointed that out.
Sleepy,
Actually, I think it was done that way to show that Hasina was barely literate in Bangla; in the novel, Nazneen herself didn't know any English until the very end. Obviously, everyone in the novel speaks Bangla perfectly well.
A lot of people were confused by this...
OK this is a lame ignorant question but I may as well ask in this thread.
I always thought that Bangladeshis (mosly Muslim) were called Bangla and Bengalis (mostly Hindu from India) were called Bongs. Am I wrong in this assumption? One group is different from the other or because of the commanality in the language they are one and the same? Because in NY I don't see the two groups mingle. Do they?
JoaT,
I believe it goes like this:
Bangla = the language
Bengali = the people
Bong = the affectionate nickname for the people
Thanx Amardeep so my question is do Bangladeshis and Bengali Indians differentiate from each other at all?
Amardeep,
Thanks. I barely remember that book but I did remember Hasina talking about reading the Quran (there was that whole thing about how she really wanted to be able to read it in Arabic) so I just assumed she was literate. Now, I think about it, a lot of her reading may just have been what she remembered from other people reading the Quran.
I guess I can let it go, I don't need that many reasons to dislike a book :)
My friend knows Salique's son and says he's a huge pothead -- he actually thought I was making this story up when I read it aloud to him, and then a segment about it just came on BBC news (4 pudgy men with poor English sitting in a restaurant), so he had to believe it. So in terms of the ideas of Brick Lane the book -- drug-addled kids, illiterate young wives imported from Bangladesh to marry older men and NEVER leaving the neighborhood or interacting with the larger world -- it ain't too far off. As for that community having affairs, who knows? My friend's Brit Bangladeshi boss has an arranged marriage from a girl back home and several kids, yet keeps several Brit girlfriends on the side. But a more entertaining read is Salaam Brick Lane by Tarquin Hall.
As for Brick Lane being a clubbing district, it's strictly segregated. The bottom half is full of beards and restaurants and council estates and the upper half is all the bars and vintage clothing stores. There's nothing really "western" in the Bangladeshi half, and there's barely a brown presence in the other half.
Janeofalltrades: You and I have been watching the same western.
I read a mostly favorable review in the Nation when the book came out. But the description jammed my Asian woman's antenna with negative vibes. I didn't read it after all. I suspect Desi Dancer is likely closer to the truth. But what does it say about the Booker selection committee that this book made the final cut? Again, the same old, same old hackneyed expectations from writers of certain ethnicities?
I read "Brick Lane" earlier this year and loved it. The book does not tread new waters per se, as similar subject matter was explored in Bharati Mukherjee's "Wife". As I come from a blue-collar immigrant background myself, I appreciated that Ali was able to capture the realities that come from that experience. While, I grew up in Canada, I felt that the neighbourhood described, could easily have been the brown ghetto I grew up in.
What I find fascinating about the current backlash the movie production of the novel is receiving, is that it is ironic in face of the actual content of the book. One of the storylines of the novel revolves around the attempt of group of Muslims trying to be radical through protest. Karim, one of the protagonists, is heavily involved in this radical group. Ali shows through the course of the novel, how flawed a narrow minded approach to protest can be, and how ultimately it can be riddled hypocritical and unproductive.
If anything, the current protest is a funny example of life imitating art.
Thanx Amardeep so my question is do Bangladeshis and Bengali Indians differentiate from each other at all?
I think they dont differnetiate as much as the Punjabis from Indian Punjab differentiate themselves from the Punjabis in Pakistani Punjab. I do know Urdu speakers from Delhi-UP do not differentiate themselves from the Urdu speakers in Karachi at all. (Almost all of them have family on both sides though).
Maybe the Bengalis from Indian Bengal/Bangladesh are somewhere in the middle of Punjabis (completely seperate) and Urdu speakers (no difference).
I also wonder about the this dynamic between Indian Tamils and Sri Lankan Tamils.
pressed post to soon...meant to say in last line of 2nd paragraph...Ali shows through the course of the novel, how flawed a narrow minded approach to protest can be, and how ultimately it can be riddled with hypocrisy and be counter-productive.
The spoken Bengali in Bangladesh and Indian West Bengal can be quite different. The Bengali of East Bengali refugees of 1947, (who spoke Bangla dialects similar to Bangladeshis) is fast disappearing among their progeny in India. Written Bengali is more or less the same across the border. Muslim Bengalis tend to use smatterings of Urdu in their Bengali. For example, water is paani among Muslims. Hindu Bengalis say jol.
do Bangladeshis and Bengali Indians differentiate from each other at all?
On both sides of the border, bangla (Bengali language) has quite a few dialects which are almost unintelligible by the "standard" bangla speakers. Leaving that aside, the "standard" bangla spoken in both West Bengal and Bangladesh will be mostly understood by all bangalis (Bengali people), even though there are some phonological variations and a difference in the relative influence of Perso-Arabic and Sanskrit words. The script is identical.
The big difference between them is of course the religious affiliation - West bengal is Hindu majority and Bangladesh is Muslim majority - which also explains the differences in lexical influences. The division of Bengal, the awful way it was handled and the terrible pre-partition and post-partition riots caused a lot of mistrust and resentment. It has not been completely forgotten yet and the lack of mingling you see in the diasporic bangali community is partially a result of that bitterness. Also the religious celebrations that typically unite any desi community are not shared, so that reduces the chances of getting together.
However, the celebration of language and culture is still a big uniting force - two big events are Nababarsho (Bengali new year) and Rabindrajayanti (Rabindranath's birthday). Bangladesh's poets like Samsur Rahaman, writers like Taslima Nasreen and Rabindrasangeet singers like Rezwana Banya Chaudhuri are iconic figures in West Bengal.
The assertion of Bengali identity and aspirations over a pan-Islamic one inspired the freedom struggle of Bangladesh. Since independence, it has been a very interesting struggle between those two forces.
Dipanjan thank you for the wonderful and detailed explaination.
That was very detailed Dipanjan. My grandparents who came over from Bangladesh during the partition of Bengal still speak in their native Bangal dialect when talking to their peers or cussing people. I can understand most of the words but I would have trouble figuring them out in real time, which hampers my fluency in the dialect. I was pleasantly surprised to find a 2nd-Gen Bangladeshi girl speak the dialect perfectly, even recently. But I guess it makes sense, since that is the only version she grew up with. It struck me as quaint that a Texan would speak the language of my grandparents better than I could.
I am a FOB+9 (nine years ago, I was a FOB). I run into similar anachronisms a lot when I talk to my 2nd-gen cousins and nephews. So much of their Indian experience and identity is shaped by their parents and others from their parents' generation that sometimes I find myself in a timewarp - a surreal combination of 70s Calcutta and 21st century USA.
DesiDudeInGotham:
And there are many young Punjabis born and raised in the UK, Canada, and California, who speak better Punjabi than young (or even middle-aged) Punjabi people born and raised (and still living in) Lahore and Chandigarh. It's a total failure of the system and society in India/Pakistan.
Dipanjan,
Both hindu and muslim bangalis love nazrul and nazrulgeet, don't they? Another uniting factor.
My grandparents were refugees from Bangladesh, and pronounced 'sh' as 's' - so 'eshegache?' became 'esegache?', among other uniquenesses. I wish I could've picked more of this up before they died.
Bengali, as you know, is precious to Bengalis like almost nothing else - bangalis are fanatics about their bhasa, so it is very odd that anything else can intervene in this love. I remember sitting very lonely in a shawarma joint in the town I'd just moved to for a job, and hearing some bengali words that warmed me immediately. They were followed by the speaker asking repeatedly whether the food he was ordering was 'halal? you're sure it's halal??'. It sounded a very alien note to me in the middle of that warmth. Not repellent, just alien.
when i wuz in bangladesh 2 years ago i was saying something to my mother, and my uncle (her brother) laughed out loud. he explained that what i'd said was a quaint form of comilla (where my family is from in bangladesh) dialect that he hadn't really heard in many years (most of my family lives abroad or dhaka). it has become clear to my that my speech has a somewhat retro and small-town feel to it :) also, my understanding is that some of the differences re: urdu terminology was due to sanskritization of elite bengali speech (of which the hindu bhadrolok were the guardians).
also, i suspect it is a mistake to dichotomize the dialects of east and west bengal and two separate groups. the various dialects of eastern bengal, from that of sylhet to barisal to bogra to chittagong are very different, and those of the western regions are probably more like that the rural dialects across the border in india than they are like the speech of comilla or sylhet. the unifier has been the spread of dhaka standard among the elites who move from city to city.
and yes, closer than punjabis from pakistan and india. no offense to punjabis but they don't seem to have a "love of language" in the way bengalis do. my parents socialized with many pakistanis, and the most intense arguments always had to with the tendency for pakistanis, mostly punjabis, to dismiss the language issue. they offered that they were teaching their own children urdu, not punjabi, so they didn't understand why east bengalis couldn't have gotten aboard the 'lingua franca' (my understanding is that punjabi sikhs tend to be more linguistically identified than muslims or hindus).
DQ,
Yes, I missed Nazrul geeti - it is an important musical genre. My maternal grandparents
were also refugees from Bangladesh.
Do you think you were repelled by the religious aspect brought out by the word halal or just its (harsh?) sound? I know that a lot of hindu bangalis do not like the word pani(water), but I always thought it sounds very soothing.
About the love of our bhasa and how precious it is to us, I don't know. Nowadays almost everyone I know in West Bengal, who is younger to me, seems to study in English-medium schools where Bangla is hardly taught and they watch bollywood and Hindi soaps in their spare time. Bangla is rapidly becoming a third language in West Bengal, at least in the urban areas. I believe the situation is much better in Bangladesh.
and yes, closer than punjabis from pakistan and india. no offense to punjabis but they don't seem to have a "love of language" in the way bengalis do.
Thats true. Hindi replaced Punjabi esp. for Hindu Punjabis who moved out of Punjab. Lala Lajpat Rai and other nationalists and Arya Samajis were pro-Hindi.
i think a language captures folkways and even a vision of seeing the world, so i think for a punjabi interested in punjabi culture, learning punjabi is valuable if one wants to connect to their culture to speak the language. one gets a sense of punjabi culture from the language. the ryhtmic nature of how you speak punjabi is neat. i actually think the language conflicts in south india are whack. learn as many as you can 'mang
*South India = South Asia
Dipanjan,
I wasn't repelled, really. I felt such a connection when I heard them speaking Bengali that I wanted to speak with them. Then when the guy was so adamant about his food being 'halal', I thought they might not want to speak with me (I'm not, after all, 'halal'). When I'm in India, and I hear a Canadian or American voice, it is an oddly similar feeling of connection. Then if I hear the Canadian/American criticizing or mocking something Indian, I'm instantly alienated.
That is very sad about bangla disappearing. I hope this phenomenon is isolated to the elite urban middle classes. I can't believe people would abandon the language of Bankimchandra, Tagore, of Satyajit Ray. There are a few languages (French is one, Russian is another) that seem to give birth to a people rather than the reverse. In those people, I think, there springs up a deep reverence for their poets. The French idolize their authors, the Russians adore Pushkin just as the Bengalis adore Tagore - as though he were a relative, or something.
Did your grandparents end up in Shillong, by any chance?
Exactly Dipanjan. I present to you my brother from across the pond with the quaint Comilla expressions as a perfect example of what I am talking about!
Razib, the Bengali that I speak is probably a lot more sanskritized than what my grandparents spoke, but I only have my parents to blame for it ;) They learnt bangla literature at school and most written bangla was the gentrified version. Consequently, this is the language they speak at home and with their friends and contemporaries. Ofcourse, most of bhadralok Calcutta speaks the "refined" bangla. You must read Amitava Ghosh's "A Circle of Reason" where he lovingly describes the Chittagong dialect and the pride among its speakers who claim that if spoken sufficiently fast, it is unintelligible to any outsider.
Perhaps you are being a bit too harsh Amitabh. I don't see how "the system" is responsible for vernacular education. I know a few guys from Chandigarh and they speak Punjabi pretty well. Naturally, one cannot expect the vernacular to be taught outside that state -- since that would cause total logistical chaos. So a Delhi-boy's Punjabi is likely to be as bad as a Delhi-boy's Bengali -- since most of their education is in English and Hindi.
you could argue that punjabis in the past respected writers like waris shah, or even as recent as sahir ludhianvi or even amrita pritam - granted that i am unaware of the more deeper punjabi poets discussed earlier in another thread. i think nowdays, weirdly enough, its bhan-gra pride which expresses that level of love that people have for their desh land
i think for punjabis there is a pride of language but there has been so much upheavel that a lot of that pride has become translated in ways beyond language, like music
DQ, that was really cool about how you're remarking on bengali. personally i've always come across the "conventional wisdom" as it were that bengali people were really passionate and literate
btw, i wish other puns besides sikh punjabis would take up the banner for punjabi, its all of our heritage
The pan-Bengali identity is very strong in Calcutta. Bangladeshi theatre, music and art is celebrated among Calcutta's artsy set and are regularly featured at Nandan, the Rabindra Sadan and the venerable Academy of Fine Arts (these are all theatres and venues of art in central Calcutta).
Rest assured the appreciation for Bangla culture is definitely not waning. I had the good fortune to be at the celebration of Tagore's birthday (its an important day in the Bengali cultural calendar) at the Consulate in New York and was surprised to see an endearingly amateurish program presented by the local teenagers. It recalls my days in school in Ballygunge, Calcutta where we had a similar programme to celebrate the bard's birthday.
It took me some time to get used to most of the heavy literary Bangla when I arrived on the scene as a Bombay kid in short pants. Fortunately, I had a clear singing voice and I joined in the festivities, singing the Rabindrasangeet that I'd always heard on the vinyl LPs at home. I am tempted to hypothesise that music and poetry are much better at preserving language since they are perpetuated by oral tradition.
Any cunning linguists in the house willing to explore my hypothesis?
i used to lurk at soc.culture.bengali, and sometimes the bangladeshis would taunt the west bengalis that calcutta was turning into a hindi city.
as for love of bengali, my parents do assert that knowing bengali is important because if you do not know bengali you are not part of the bengali people and you are not part of the spirit. the translation is a little weird, but you get the gist. when i was in bangladesh i did notice a trend though, acceptance of the fact that my bengali speech is childish, and my illiteracy, were taken with great equaimity by my extremely religious relatives. in contrast, my more secular relatives were much more concerned. so there is a tension here, and it has cropped up in bangaldeshi/east bengali society & culture since the 19th century when a bengali speaking muslim middle class emerged (prior to this time period of the muslim middle and upper class in bengal was urdu speaking of course, and my paternal grandfather actually comes from a 'bengalized' family as his father grew up bilingual in urdu and bengali).
and yes, closer than punjabis from pakistan and india. no offense to punjabis but they don't seem to have a "love of language" in the way bengalis do.
RAZIB: Thats true. Hindi replaced Punjabi esp. for Hindu Punjabis who moved out of Punjab. Lala Lajpat Rai and other nationalists and Arya Samajis were pro-Hindi.
Come on now, what's with the silly first comment. Too provincial and uninformed.
Razib brings up an interesting point. It is a well-known fact that there was a sustained effort by the powers that be to suppress Punjabi in Punjab. If you want to kill a people's culture/core, kill their language...this is very true of what was attempted in Punjab in the seventies/eighties...
Seriously, Punjab and Sikhs come up often on Sepia and I find that many here can really use some more research in this area, whether it's language, human rights, religious beliefs or the broader culture.
And yes, let's not forget BHANGRA,which is a big part of our musical heritage. The rest of India seems so in love with it as well, so they stick it in every other bollywood film.
I'd have to credit folks in the UK and Canada for reviving bhangra many years ago in a way that you cannot help but love it. Way to go guys! Keep it rockin'
"Seriously, Punjab and Sikhs come up often on Sepia and I find that many here can really use some more research in this area, whether it's language, human rights, religious beliefs or the broader culture."
wut r u trying to say?
Razib - this is really fascinating - so prior to your grandfather's generation, your ancestors and mine would have conversed in what language? English? I mean, would they have lived across the field from each other and spoken in different languages the whole time? (not that this should be overly surprising, I live in Canada where Anglos and Francos live in that exact manner...)
Btw - do you have any stories your family told you about Hindu-Muslim relations in Bangladesh prior to and during Partition? I'd like to hear from the 'other' side.
so prior to your grandfather's generation, your ancestors and mine would have conversed in what language?
only my paternal grandfathers. the rest of my family wouldn't have an issue, they were bangali through and through. my paternal grandfather's family were the hereditary alams (prayer leaders) of their village, and, as my mother likes to joke, "they're not really bengali." i suppose they would have known some bengali, as their tenants (they collected land rents) spoke that language.
Btw - do you have any stories your family told you about Hindu-Muslim relations in Bangladesh prior to and during Partition? I'd like to hear from the 'other' side.
my paternal grandmother was born into a hindu family. they converted when she was a toddler. or, more precisely, her father converted and bought out his brothers' shares in the factory they owned together :) they moved to calcutta before partition, we don't keep in touch with them. she subsequently married into the wealthiest local muslim family (see above), cementing the islamic status of her family (though they still keep a lot of hindu folkways, they were brahmins or something i think, and they have separate sets of dishes and shit for guests?). i recently also found out through and offhand remark by my mother than her father's family converted relatively recently, within the last few hundred years.
in any case, relations? well, my maternal grandfather was the only muslim (bengali) doctor in several of the villages where he practiced as a child, and i can tell you he resented the hindus who were his colleagues as he was out of place. that made him rather pro-pakistani. in contrast hsi children and my father had to deal with muslim (bihari) domination, so they were more ambivalent about pan-islamism. so life history matters.
i think a lot of hindu-muslim relations can be broken down via class analysis. but, you have to factor in historical contingencies. my understanding is that muslim bengalis until the past hundred years or so tended to "urduize" themselves. when that path was blocked, something new had to arise, ergo, bengali speaking elite muslims. my family is evidence of the reverse, bengalization of urdu speakers (my paternal grandfather).
Unbelievable plot? Yes. Contrived? Yes. Offensive? Hardly.
I found Hasina's story to be more compelling than wotsit's (sheesh, forgotten the protagonist's name). The English in Hasina's letters was very annoying as it belittled her experience. If Bangla was their first language, why the hell would they write letters in English? And if the letters were written in Bangla and Ali had translated them to English for us, then why would it be riddled with imbecilic grammar?
The fact that the protagonist had an affair is less unbelievable than the fact she had an affair with a YOUNGER 2/1.5 generation dude. In Bangladesh, a female marrying/dating a younger guy is as much of a taboo as becoming a lesbian.
Apart from the protagonist and her lover, I think Ali captured the essence of British Bangladeshis living in Brick Lane quite accurately.
omg, dude, you saw my mom sing. that trips me out.
Anyway, I disagree somewhat, at least about bangla in india. My cousins who grew up in Cal speak a mix of (bongified :) Hindi and Bangla and English in their daily lives because of their social circles and their schools. My cousins in Howrah probably speak more Bangla. My little niece and nephew in Delhi might not end up speaking very well at all--and certainly not reading or writing as well.
And of course there's me and my pidgin New York Benglish :) Ba-gel khabi? Schmear ni-e.
Also what no one has mentioned is that most of the Bangladeshis in the UK are specifically SYLHETI. My understanding is that they're the "peasants" of Bangladesh with their own dialect, and there's tension between them and the more "upper class" types who immigrated from Dhaka. My graphic designer bf (born in Dhaka) almost got lynched last year in Brick Lane by a mob of restauranteur goondas because he accused one of having no aesthetic (weird thing to want to knife someone for, but there you go -- it was really about class in the end, I think), and his Sylheti boss had to step in and calm them down. When a long-lost cousin visited from Dhaka recently, he straight-up said that no one from their family should be working for Sylhetis, that it was shameful. My bf isn't too concerned on that front, but he does constantly moan about how uneducated and backwards the UK Bangladeshis are, which drives his Satyajit-Ray-and-Tagore-loving girl cousin up the wall. So the discussion of what's Bengali and what's Bangladeshi probably means something slightly different in the U.S. and the UK.
I can't quote percentages, but anecdotally I can confirm that the community of Bangladeshis vastly outnumbers the population of Indian Bengalis here in the UK.
There are Indian Bengalis around, but nowhere near in as many numbers as the various North Indian groups I've mentioned previously.
That is not true about Sikhs. Sikhs have a love for the Punjabi language that is more than the fact that it is a scared language for them. It's a deep rooted love and passion for Punjabi that is even in the soul of secular non practising Sikhs.
I understand exactly what Jackson Paul is trying to say -- and it's very well-meaning -- but can I just clarify that no language is considered "sacred" in Sikhism, including Punjabi. In terms of holy texts -- of whatever religion -- it is the meaning behind the words which is considered sacred, not the language in which the words are spoken/written.
However, Sikh scriptures (and the associated hymns) are written in Punjabi script -- although the language used is not always Punjabi (it includes Persian, Hindi, "Braj" dialects etc) -- so it is recommended that people should be familiar with Punjabi in order to help them understand the teachings when read in their original form.
The majority -- although not all -- of Sikhs are, of course, of Punjabi extraction themselves, so the language does have an added resonance for them due to that reason too.
I read the book and absolutely loved it. Here was an author who was not afraid of being truly and absolutely nonconformist. I don't feel that there is a need for her to explain, in absolute terms, the reason one of her characters decided to write letters in a certain style. Though she sports an upper-class education, she has wholeheartedly seized the opportunity to enter the minds and lives of characters of a "lower" social stratum and makes some astounding discoveries in the process. While painters have experimented with colours and generated awe-inspiring works over centuries, writers have shied away from being original and have always catered to the whims of the dollar-wielding public that is mostly looking for a cheap and momentary "high" instead of a prolonged tantric orgasm that fulfils the libido as well as the soul.
A Rembrandt might be understood and enjoyed by everyone at a superficial level; but, a Munch will only be appreciated by the truly learned who have taken the time and displayed the inclination to understand the gentle undercurrents that coexist within the painting. Enjoying a Rembrandt is akin to enjoying watching yourself in the mirror, all kitted up in designer sports-wear, with the intention of setting off for a 10 Km run; whilst, appreciating a Munch requires enjoying the 10 Km run in itself, and most of all, the painful weariness at the end of the run (much enjoyment also lies in sipping some cold beer later on. But, that's another matter altogether). Essentially, to enjoy great authors, one must be a great reader. You may not like Monica Ali, but mark my words, her writing is material that will become the text books your kids read tomorrow. Labelling Monica Ali to be not readable as she does not write in a certain style, prescribed by has-been booker-prize winners, is not fair on her; it merely questions your credibility to qualify as her reader. She is the future of English literature; that, and shes hot!
Peace
Yeah - James Joyce, Proust, Alain Robbe-Grillet, Vladimir Nabokov, Salman Rusdhie, VS Naipaul, Saul Bellow, they were all figments of our imagination, and nobody has done anything with the novel until Monica Ali.
.Hold on. You are questioning other people's credibility as readers?
Oh, I got it, you're a prankster, right? Phew!
Digressing a little bit, because of the interesting discussion about Benglai dialects.. I have a question about the Kalighat on Bengal. I've just started reading "Mother India" by Katherine Mayo written in the 1920s (commented by people as one of the worst books written about India, Gandhi has supposedly referred to this book as a "drain inspector's report")..She writes about seeing "kids" being sacrificed in the famous Kalighat in Calcutta and supposedly 150-200 kids are killed (sacrificed) everyday.. Is she just lying or is there some truth to it. I was shocked to read that though..
Ponniyin, she means "kids" as in goats. And I think that part is plausible, though there are many, many problems with the book, starting with the fact that it was sponsored by the British Intelligence Services. I blogged about it here.
Mayo also writes about some really implausable stuff like hindu mothers feeding their babies Opium when they cry. Like most of her stuff I guess it has a grain of truth to it albiet greatly exxagerated.
Anyways read the Sepia Englih prof's report on the book.
Amardeep,
Thanks for the info. that is a nice blog..
My understanding is that they're the "peasants" of Bangladesh with their own dialect, and there's tension between them and the more "upper class" types who immigrated from Dhaka.
my cuz (16) regularly gets beat up on his way home from school by sylheti kids. when my father taught at the local college in sylhet in bangladesh in the early 1970s the natives were clear about distinguishing themselves from "bengalis" (and "bengal") as they still had an "assamese" identity (despite their language).
I didn't even see Amardeep's comment. And I spelt english wrong, ah well I just woke up...
Many syllhetis speak a language that's virtually unintelligble to other bangla speakers and vice versa. This leads to some amount of frustration (in my personal experience) on both sides. Further, Syllhet is a place on the outskirts of bongland, so there's a geographic element to this too (I don't know enough to comment ont he class dynamics, but I wouldn't doubt it). I've also heard that more orthodox versions of religion tend to proliferate there, but that's just hearsay.
Thanks Razib.
Any other bengalis out there hear the story from their grannies about Dhaka muslin (before the Brits shut down production) - about it being fine and sheer enough, so that you could crumple it up and stuff it into a silver canister that fit into the palm of your hand? (There may be a bit of exaggeration involved here...)
matchbox..DQ :)
The more exotic the better in this case PGW :) Mango it is, then.
I mean, who would have tried that, with the mango? Some bengali hubby trying to get back at his wife? Probably had to pay for it.
I have a very old great uncle who entertains me with stories about life in Bangladesh before partition, and in paricticular about our family place, which was called Kolagachi (literally, Banana-Treed). He paints it so beautifully it is like a dream - the river near the house where they took boat rides, the pond with enormous fish (the fish get more enormous with each retelling) which they would eat fresh every day, the fact that they would sit around and sing and write poetry all day. No one else in the family has any time to listen to these stories, and everyone thinks he is 'wringing out the towel of Kolgachi' over and over again. I love to hear him. I sit there in my jeans and inappropriate top and nasal accent and 'attitude', rapt and truly deferential for once. Everyone thinks its bloody weird my dreamer-jetu and I have this connection.
No, they were from Barisal and Jashore and moved to Calcutta before partition. I have heard similar stories about abundance from them. In post-partition Calcutta, it was a common joke among the ghotis that back in East Pakistan, all bangals were jomidars (landlords) with gola-bhara-dhan and pukur-bhara-maachh (storehouse full of rice and ponds full of fishes). Sure, some of the stories were hazed by nostalgic exaggeration, but most of what they said was probably true.
First time posting here, and i must say you guys have got quite an interesting discussion going on here.
Ponniyin Selvan you noted that the writer Katherine Mayo writing of 1920s Kalighat, Calcutta/Kolkata speaks of 150-200 kids being sacrificed everyday. I dont know the veracity of her claims since i have not read that book, but if "noro bolee" as human sacrifice is known in Bengal existed in Calcutta as late as the 1920s, then definitely me having spent all my college life in Calcutta in the mid 1990s, would have known of it.
That does not mean that "noro bolee" was not practiced in Bengal. It primarily occurred during Kali Pujo and Durga Pujo, where humans were sacrificed to the Goddesses and the practice was primarily the domain of the upper, wealthy classes and not something that was widespread among the population.
I believe that the practice started to die out with the advent and spread of British colonial rule in Bengal and by the late 18th century the practice had died out. However, I have never read anything where there was evidence that young children were sacrificed. I could very well be wrong about my assertion, maybe folks here could dig in on that subject.
related, perhaps we can in the future have a discussion on tantra and religion in south asia vis a vis ideas of human nature and sin
It was interesting reading some of the critiques made for Monica Ali's "Brick Lane". For ex:
Desi Dancer wrote "I cringe to think it would hold company with some of the previous Booker recipients".
Taz "I thought the book was crap, but my mother loved it".
Saurabh "They should be protesting over that being considered for a Booker at all. That first sentence is terrible".
I actually found the book to be pretty interesting. Granted Monica Ali's language in her first published work does not possess the lyrical charm a la Arundhuti Roy in "God of Small Things". Compared to Hanif Kureshi's inimical humourous satirical style in "The Black Album" a book of the same genre in that it examines the lives of Pakistani immigrant society in England and the growing fundamentalist radical streak among its members, Monica Ali's "Brick Lane" and the manner of her writing style in which she describes the lives of her Bangladeshi immigrant characters is pretty dark and grim.
However, her book clearly illustrates the stark existential reality of underclass immigrants in a western land. The picture she paints isn't pretty but hey thats reality and i for one who did not particularly enjoy her writing style nonetheless liked the book and how she approached the subject matter and drew a picture of a people, while not pretty, it was definitely illuminating.
Taz i think i know why your mother loved the book. I think she was able to relate to the characters in the book and the thought processes that were at work behind what they did and why they did. It is as simple as that.
The protests over the filming of her book reminded me of the protests that swept Calcutta during the filming of "City of Joy", or the ones that occured in Varanasi that eventually stopped the shooting of Deepa Mehta's "Water", and how the protestors claimed that the film would paint the cities in a bad light. Having spent all my college years in Calcutta in the mid 90s, and having visited Varanasi and seeing for myself the dire hopeless lives of those widows, i could never understand the reasoning behind those claims. It was all bloody bull as far as i was concerned, where basically a bunch of backward thugs with a seige mentality were involved in organizing the protests, and the protests against the filming of "Brick Lane" reminds me of the same.
I got a few questions though and maybe the folks here could help shed some light on them.
As far as i know, Bangladesh during the language movement till its liberation struggle and some years thereafter was a largely secular society. What happened in between say 1975 and later whereby there was a growing fundamentalist radicalization and trasformation of Bangladeshi society so much so, that now the Razakars, a section of the Bangladeshi elite along with certain groups of people who actually fought against the Bangladeshi liberation movement and openly cooperated with the Pakistani army, in the slaughter of Bangladeshi secular liberal intellectuals and freedom fighters during the liberation movement, now have asserted themselves back into helm of Bangladeshi society and are now part of the ruling class? What changed? What gives?
Amardeep, this is all good stuff, but when will we get another piece on Punjabi Literature?
We Sylheti's are a seperate ethnic group within Bangladesh. A minority of less than 10% back home but a majority in the UK and the US. We have our own culture, language, food and habits similar to but not exactly corresponding to, the Dhakaiya Bengalis.
The Dhakaiyas are only recent arivals to the UK. They arive on student visas and often don't have a right of abode here. And Sylheti families of second and third generation girld and boys like me don't want to marry Dhakaiya freshies from back home with their third world habits of controlling women and sending money back to their poor relatives back home.
Many Dhakaiyas are arrogant and think they are better than us because they come from middleclass families back home but fail to realise that most second and third generation Sylhetis are middleclass professionals bought up and educated in Britain. Many of these 'intellectual' Dhakaiyas can barely speak English but think they are elites!!!