Dear Moderator,
The attached article on Ekushey for possible publication in your esteemed
website.
With kind regards.
Md. Anwarul Kabir
Assistant Professor & Research Coordinator
Department of Computer Science
American International University-Bangladesh
Kemal Ataturk Avenue
Banani, Dhaka
Dhaka 1213
Bangladesh
9890415, 8815386 Fax 00 88 02 8813233
url: http://www.aiub.edu
alternative email: kabiranwar@yahoo.com
Ekushey spirit and the young mind
Md. Anwarul Kabir
'After 54 years, I think we can stop lamenting over the loss of four to five lives. In one launch accident during monsoon we lose as many as 200 lives,' this arrogant comment made by a young university student in an interview-based interesting article (New Age, February 2007) captured the mindset of the new generation centring our glorious 21st February. In the same article, while another student was asked to assess the significance of Ekushey, his short snapped answer was, 'It is a holiday'. Although, in that article, many members of the same generation evaluated our language movement rightfully focusing on the actual spirits of Ekushey, the quoted numb statements negating significance of the Ekushey, indeed, support the prevailing common perception that the new generation has been uprooted from our cultural heritage, a crucial element of identifying oneself. In other word, it can be argued that the new generation has been severely suffering from identity crisis. If we objectively assess the whole picture and analyse the young generations, specifically of the urban middle class and their practices in various cultural aspects, a sort of identity crisis on their part will definitely surface on the ground. Here, emphasising on the young generation of urban middle class is purposeful because evidences dictate that the young people from urban middle class of present highly polarised social structure brewed out of neo-capitalism eventually set themselves at the power centre of different social strata of the state and Bangladesh is no exception.
Before outlying cultural practices of the young generation, it is prudent to identify the spirit of Ekushey and its relationship to Bengali nationalism. A simplistic notion on our language movement is that the spirit of Ekushey lies in getting proper recognition of the majority spoken language Bangla under the framework of post independent Pakistan. This notion, in fact, fails to capture actual spirit of Ekushey.
In quest of discovering cultural discourse of present Bangladesh, Nayanika Mookherjee, an Indian ethnographer (Anthropology Matters Journal, 2001) has argued that after the partition in 1947, the Pakistani government's antipathy towards Bengali culture in East Pakistan (now Bangladesh) was nourished by the notion that though nominally Muslims, Bengalis are unreliable coreligionists for their 'relatively recent' conversion' from low-caste Hindu status. Portraying the practice of Islam in East Pakistan as too Bengali (hence to Hinduized), the successive Pakistani regimes embarked on a strategy of forcible cultural assimilation towards the Bengalis. The denial of Bengali as the state language and Jinnah's infamous declaration, " There can be one lingua franca and that language should be Urdu and cannot be any other", on the Dhaka university convocation on March 24, 1948 was in fact a part of that plea. This led to instant protest to this declaration by some students of Dhaka University and subsequent massive language movement in 1952 with wide participation of people from all levels of the society. The crucial motivating factors for this mass upsurge can only be explained clearly if we consider socio-cultural, political and economic aspects. To counter Pakistan's different attempts for 'Islamaziation' of cultural aspects of the inhabitants of this region (for instance inclusion of more Arabic/Urdu/Persian vocabularies and exclusion of Sanskrit words from our Bengali script, restriction on Rabindra Tagore's songs ), people of this land participated in the movement to upheld the secular features of Bengali nationalism. In this respect, Nurul Kabir's (New Age, February 2007) proposition that the language movement was a protest against social injustice should also be considered. Imposition of the minority's language Urdu (It may be noted that Urdu was the common language of the Muslims feudal class and the majority of the ruling Muslim League leaders were from this class but it was not any major language of any province in Pakistan.) on the majority population of the then Pakistan was marked as social injustice and a blow to the democratic ethos. Again, the present writer (Financial Express, February, 2007) has observed, the major aspiration for participation of the people of this region in Pakistan movement during last decade of British regime was to achieve their economic salvation. However, the newly emerged country Pakistan at that time utterly failed to fulfil the promises of the Muslim League which they pledged during the Pakistan movement. So, it can be argued that one of the motivating factors behind large scale participation of the common people in the language movement was a sort of protest against exploitation by the Pakistani regime in the economic front.
So, in line with the above explanations, in a nut shell, it can be stated that the spirit of the Ekushey grew out of cultural, political and economic issues. Cultural aspiration of this movement was to uphold the secular Bengali nationalism in all aspects of lives. The political and economic aspirations of this movement were to create democratic ethos with a view to establishing an exploitation free society. It is worthwhile to note that the spirit of Ekushey acted as the vital force in our war of liberation.
Now the question is to what extent the new generation, especially of the urban middle class of contemporary Bangladesh, is following the spirit of Ekusehy in their everyday life?
Over the decade, the salient features of this representative young generation have been dramatically changed. If we closely observe various cultural aspects and the life style of this generation then it would not be that hard to grab the fact that this generation has much deviated from the aforesaid spirit of Ekushey. The intrigue for Bengali literature and cultural aspects on part of this generation has been diminishing to a remarkable extent. A few members from this generation take interest in reading books especially those on Bengali literature as the overall reading habit of the generation has regrettably declined over the period. In day-to-day conversation, in general, they use mangled Bangla infused with large scale English and Hindi vocabularies. In this context Farhad Mazhar (New Age February 2000), a noted poet and writer has asserted that the advertisement of various cellular phone companies capture the language of the urban middle-class youth which is mixed up with English, Hindi vocabularies to a large extent in Bengali dialect in order to appear smart and cool. This new Creole (popularly known as dejuice Bangla) has a greater impact on the everyday conversation of this generation. Even the electronic media, especially private FM band radio stations and some private TV channels are promoting this sub culture of language practice in their different programs . In Bangla practice discourse, Syed Badrul Ahsan, an eminent columnist in an editorial (Daily Star, February 2008) has observed that proper pronunciations and accents of Bengali words are not being maintained by the new generation and the electronic media show little respect to the issue.
In attire, this urban young generation are visibly westernised. The dresses they wear, specifically those of the boys are hardly distinguishable from their counter parts in the west. Even the dresses of young girls have been gradually westernised day by day. Young girls hardly prefer to wear sarees, a symbol of Bengali culture unless it is a special occasion. Shalwar-Kamiz replaces sarees to a great extent. In fact, in case of urban young girls' attire, at present, the influence of Bollywood style is predominant. However, the phenomenon of wearing western dresses, like T-shirts and trousers has also succeeded in creating special appeal to the urban young girls of the country. In everyday life, besides some occasions (e.g. wedding ceremonies, Pohela Baishakh, religious programs), the Bengali attires like punjabi-payjama/lungi/sarees have lost their appeal to the psyche of the young generation. This transformation in attire obviously signifies a visible deviation of this generation from Bengali culture.
Food habit of the young generation has also been changed to a greater extent. The presence of coca-cola and McDonald culture has driven away the indigenous food habit. Indigenous foods like pithas, chira-muri, doi, even the delicious fruits like mangoes, jackfruits fail to appeal to the contemporary urban young generation. The preference of western snacks like burgers, pizzas, sandwiches, chicken fries, etc. is predominant now. Coca-cola or other fizzy drinks have replaced the indigenous drinks like sharbat and green coconut water. To this generation, on special occasions, Chinese dishes have more appeal than indigenous exotic foods and traditional Mughlai menus. Though the food habit symbolises the uniqueness of a nation, the young generation under question has shifted much away from Bengali cultural heritage.
Perhaps, in independent Bangladesh, the least application of the spirit of Ekushey can be revealed in political and economic arena. Participation in politics by this young generation with a real commitment to the nation is not common nowadays though, in pre-independent Bangladesh the urban young generation upholding the spirit of Ekushey played a significant role in our liberation war. The members of the present young generation are now more self–centred and career oriented. Even those who participate in politics are, in fact, motivated out of vested interest. For them, politics is a short cut way to material gain. To them democracy, economic emancipation etc. signify powerful tools to exploit the poor people of the country. Secularism, which is one of the ingredients of the spirit of Ekushey, has lost its appeal to this generation. Rise of Islamic extremism and increasing participation of young generation in communal politics like Jamat-shibir, Hizbut Tahiri or other fundamental groups support this assertion.
Above discussion has revealed the deviation of the young generation from the spirit of Ekushey. But blaming them solely for this would be a severe injustice as they are the creation of this society. In this case we should rather consider the national and global socio-economic, political and cultural realities of the present time. The following points try to unmask the causes behind the deviation from the spirit of Ekushey on part of the contemporary young generation in general and the urban young generation in particular.
a)The practice of deformed hybrid Bangla is not acceptable at all. In fact an objective analyse will find that this problem lies in our education system. From primary to tertiary levels of our education system Bangla is now the least important subject. Though after liberation, practice of Bangla was encouraged at the state level by adopting Bangla as official language, the subsequent governments failed to chalk out an appropriate policy for promoting Bangla in educational arena. So the members of young generation get less aspiration in learning Bangla adequately in their academic pursuits.
In this context, we can not negate the adverse affect of globalization. Taking the advantage of pervasive globalisation, worldwide infusion of neo-colonial linguistic practice is predominant. Farhad Mazhar (February 2007), on this issue has pointed out that neo-colonial linguistic practice would like to prove that Bangla is a 'failed' language — just like Bangladesh is a 'failed' state. Neo-colonial Bangla is eager to demonstrate that Bangla Bhasa as a language and sign system does not have the capacity to express the day-to-day needs and concepts of a modern society, not to mention serious thoughts; its vocabulary is so poor that one must borrow English words in every sentence.
However, it is our collective failure to resist the aggression of this neo-colonial linguistic practice in order to protect our own language. The young generation, in this case, is simply the victim of the situation.
b)In attire and food habit, as we have revealed, the young generation is imitating western countries. This trend is, in fact, due to our inferiority complex generated out of identity crisis. The older generation has utterly failed to transmit the Bengali nationalism and its uniqueness into the mindset of the younger generation.
c)Lack of participation in politics of this young generation with a real commitment to the nation, lies, in fact, in our distorted political system. The post 1975 era failed to put the country on right democratic footings. From 1975 to 1990, Bangladesh was under either direct or quasi military regimes. This is historically proven that no military regime (either direct or indirect) in the world works for promoting true democracy. However, post 1990 could have been golden era for practising true democracy in the country. But due to rising impact of communalism and terrorism, corruption ridden leadership and intolerance between two major political parties, the country failed to avail that opportunity. Besides, our political leaders are utmost failure to be role models before the young generation due to lack of honestly, integrity and patriotism.
d)The young generation's participation in communal politics, though unfortunate but not unexpected, undermines the teaching of secularism. Post 1975 politics in Bangladesh has reinforced much debated religion based 'Two Nation Theory' in a new package of Bangladeshi nationalism. This can be considered as one of the major causes for the rise of communal politics. Legalisation of the communal politics contrary to the creed of the Bengali nationalism and secularism has paved the way for the young generation's involvement in communal politics.
Our distorted national history, especially of our liberation war is also responsible to misguide the young generation in this regard.
In conclusion, it can be argued that the young generation is in a loophole of our present socio-political and cultural setup. To get rid of this, in political front, we need to select the honest, prudent and pro-people leaders who have patriotic vision and mission based on the spirit of Ekushey. In cultural front, we have a long way to go. Mich/ael Billing (1995), a contemporary sociologist of the UK in his book entiltled 'Banal Nationalism' has suggested that if a nation wants to uphold its cultural aspects and heritage in the psyche of its people, continuous flagging of cultural aspects of that nation is a must. This assertion relates the popular Bengali songs, 'Ek tara bazaio na/ Du tara bazaio na/ Ek tara bazaile mone poira jai/ ek din Bangali chhilam re' (Don't play ektara/Don't play duitara/The tunes of ektara reminds me/One time I was Bengali). So, if we want to instil our cultural heritage and traditions into the mindset of the young generation, we need to practise our cultural ethos in our everyday life. We need to beckon the young generation under the parasol of our own culture exposing the richness of our cultural heritages and traditions.
Md. Anwarul Kabir is an educationist working at the computer science department of AIUB and is a freelance writer.
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