Linguistica Indica

Where languages matter !

The Writer

I am an ordinary man in love with humanity, culture, languages and life.

When I was a child I used to live with my grandparents in a small farm outside Hastinapur, the capital of my country India. We had a couple of farm animals there such as pigs, cow, horses and sheep. My grandparents used to grow vegetables and some fruits in that farm while commuting to the city for work. We had a dog named Ahimsa. He had long hair and big sloppy ears. We also had a fish named Nirvana. My grandmother used to feed her chunks of rice sometimes. But later my parents bought a new house and we moved to the city and started living in a huge apartment block in the heart of the city. In the meantime I also lived with my mother in the United Province when she was sent there for work by the government. Life was peaceful and simple. My mother said, things changed completely in the year 2047 when India became a Maoist Republic after the collapse of the Bourgeois Empire. I was very young to understand what was going on…

The alter-ego is here:

Abhishek Avtans (Lecturer of Hindi Language & Literature at Leiden University, Netherlands)

https://leidenuniv.academia.edu/AbhishekAvtans

University Profile Page

33 thoughts on “The Writer”

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  3. Abhishek
    I have bookmarked your blog and will keep on looking at it.
    Arvind

  4. Hi,

    I am looking for a Tulu linguist for a transcription project. I have a short sample of the audio file and would like to know whether the language is Tulu

    Can you help me on this

    best regards

    //pritam

  7. I stumbled on you blog by accident while searching for something on Nagaland in GOOGLE….and I was quite amazed after reading a few blogs and also seeing somethings about Nagaland written.
    I would love to come back and read the rest…

    BTW, I am from Nagaland. 🙂
    Good day 🙂

  8. Thanks James for visiting my blog!
    Its good to hear that you are from Nagaland.
    Nagaland has a very special place in my heart.
    With a kind of “Been there…Done That”…pride
    I have plans to write more on Naga languages..soon
    Welcome again

  10. Looking forward to reading more about Naga languages including Nagamese. I wish there was a Nagamese phrase book available! That would make it much easier to learn!

  12. Its a nice thing to know that people like you are appreciating the beauty of Naga language. Keep up the good work.

  13. Reached here while I was searching for Naga language. Instantly knew this has to be a blog by a JNUite. My sister is one too 🙂 Spanish language is her domain.

    Keep blogging.

  15. hello…sir…
    ‘m a student of linguistics in Calcutta university…wanna work under you…is it possible sir?

    have a nice day

  16. @Sangita
    Good to know that you are studying Linguistics.
    I will keep you posted if there is an opportunity to work in any of my projects.
    Thanks for visiting the blog

  17. we are proud to announce the second edition of Babel Film Festival wwww.babelfilmfestival.com
    BABEL FILM FESTIVAL is the first film competition whose aim is to appreciate and promote the cinema relating the linguistic minorities , giving voice to their history, culture, and language. The contest is related only for films that use those minority languages , dialects, slang or sign language.

    BABEL FILM FESTIVAL proposes to offer the possibility to any film-maker (either documentaries or fiction) to give visibility to their film and voice to their languages. BABEL FILM FESTIVAL proposes to support a real cultural comparison and exchange among the world population.

    BABEL FILM FESTIVAL is organized into four sections: shortfilm, featurefilm, documentary and videoclip.

    The participation to the contest is allowed to any filmmaker from any country and age. The registration is free there are no suggested themes the only bond is the language , that has to be the expression of a linguistic minority both social or cultural. The minority language has to be used at least for the 60% of the dialogues and scripts. Films have to be subtitled using the English language and, if possible, the Italian language too.

    Prizes:

    – prize “Maestrale” featurefilm € 10.000,00;
    – prize “Maestrale” documentary € 3.500,00;
    – prize “Maestrale” short film € 3.500,00;
    – prize “Maestrale” Città di Cagliari € 2.000,00;
    – prize FICC € 1.500,00;
    – prize DIRITTO DI PAROLA € 1.500,00.
    – prize videoclip € 1.000,00 to the author, € 6.000,00 to the band.

    Please find attached the official contest regulation.

    Looking forward to hear from you,
    sincerely,

    BFF team

  20. Dear Abhishek, I am myself a teacher here in Jharkhand India. My daughter is taking part in her School Fancy Dress competition where she is becoming a Naga Tribal Girl. I wanted to very kindly ask you if you would translate a few English sentences into Nagamese so that she can speak them on the stage. I would be very thankful. — Amitabh Roy Sharma.

  21. @ Amitabh
    Thanks for visiting. I will try to help you translate as much as I can.Please be aware that Nagamese is a creole language. Therefor complex sentences in English or Hindi might not get translated as one desires. But I will give it a try. Also please make sure your daughter identifies the specific Naga Tribe (whether Angami, Sema, Aao etc), as there is nothing called Naga tribe. They are usually identifiable by their shawls and other costumes.

  23. hi abhishek! i m mujtaba. I m a teacher in jharkhand. Posted in sahibganj. My mob no- 9708280308 when u free call me. Yr blog is good.

  24. Interesting.. Ur hobbies,and likings..
    Yes i would miss one of the day which is not wonderful to me:-)
    I like that..

  25. Hello Abhishek Avtans Sir, Happy to see your blog. The write-up on Hindi speaking tree and Naani ki kavita is really good. I saw the pictures of different old age Naani. Keep inspiring us by writing blogs. God bless you.

  30. Namaskar Ji ! Mere parivar misri hein…magar dil se….meh bilkul hindustani hoo ! Chapeu to this blog & its author !

  32. Hii Abhishek sir,
    Aapka Twitter handle locked dikha raha hai. Any personal thing or usual Twitter shit. Really tensed and curious about the same. If it’s involuntary, hope it recovers asap. Your Twitter is like a treasure that should go unharmed. Regards

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