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Hindi: Languages
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The rubric "Hindi" is often used as a catch-all for those idioms in the North Indian dialect continuum that are not recognized as languages separate from the language of the Delhi region. Panjabi, Bihari, and Chhatisgarhi, while sometimes recognised as being distinct languages, are often considered dialects of Hindi. Many other local idioms, such as the Bhili languages, which do not have a distinct identity defined by an established literary tradition, are almost always considered dialects of Hindi. In other words, the boundaries of "Hindi" have little to do with mutual intelligibility, and instead depend on social perceptions of what constitutes a language.
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Hindi first started to be used in writing during the 4th century AD. It was originally written with the Brahmi script but since the 11th century AD it has been written with the Devanāgarī alphabet. The first printed book in Hindi was John Gilchrist's Grammar of the Hindoostanee Language which was published in 1796.
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Hindi is an Indian language spoken in most states in northern and central India. It is an Indo-European language, more specifically a prakrit. Hindi became the official language of India on January 26, 1965 and is the third most spoken language in the world, after Chinese and English. About 600 million people speak, read and write Hindi, in India and abroad, and the total number of people who can understand the language exceeds 1.3 billion. In a number of countries including Fiji, Mauritius, Guyana, and Suriname Hindi is the majority language.
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Hindi belongs to the Indo-Aryan branch of the Indo-European language family. Formerly referred to as "Hindustani," now often referred to as "Hindi-Urdu, " it is a dialect continuum without clear boundaries which is spoken primarily in northern and central India by more than 180 million people in India who regard it as their mother tongue. Another 300 million use Hindi as second language. It is the language that unifies multilingual India, home to some 400 different languages/dialects. Outside of India, Hindi is spoken in Nepal, South Africa, Mauritius, U.K., U.S., Yemen, Uganda, Germany, New Zealand, Singapore, United Arab Emirates. Such a wide distribution, makes Hindi/Urdū the fifth most spoken language in the world.
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Despite Hindi being among Chinese, Spanish and English as the most spoken languages, there is a dearth of resources on the subject(s), and even fewer which are worth-while. Instead of anger of frustration, the Hindi student should instead feel a smug superiority of being ahead of everyone else who are learning other languages, which may fill the rows of bookshelves in bookstores now, but cannot compare with the vast amount of volumes to be written on Hindi in the future! Here is a list of the better books and dictionaries. Stay away from books written for Indians who already know another related Indian language (such as the National Integration series), which make such claims as "Learn This or That Language in 30 days!" Remember the rule of thumb: If it sounds too good to be true, it usually is. If you know German, Margot Gatzlaff-Hälsig, has continued the incomparable German tradition of Indologie with two dictionaries and numerous books on Hindi.
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In Hindi as well as , there are only two genders for nouns. All male human beings and male animals (or those animals and plants which are perceived to be "masculine") are masculine. All female human beings and female animals (or those animals and plants which are perceived to be "feminine") are feminine. Things, inanimate articles and abstract nouns are ... either masculine or feminine according to convention, which must be memorised by non-Hindi speakers if they wish to learn correct Hindi. While this is the same as and similar to many other Indo-European languages such as French and Spanish, it is a very challenging learning requirement for many people in south India who are native speakers of languages which do not feature such inflecton, but are expected by the government to learn Hindi. It is also a challenge for those who are used to only the English language, which although an Indo-European language, has dropped nearly all of its gender inflection.
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