Read a Lot, Read in Your Own Language

Expressing concern over the growing distance between the English-driven new generation and their own language, writers today warned that this could lead to a loss of the native culture.

“Read a lot, read in your own language. Otherwise you stand to lose the whole richness of your own culture”, acclaimed children’s writer Anushka Ravishankar exhorted school students, who had come together for an absorbing session of story-telling on the second day of the Odisha Literary Festival 2013 here on Friday.

Attention to the issue was drawn by noted academic and translator Prof Bikram Das, who observed that children of today were becoming more and more alienated from their own language and consequently their own culture.

“There seems to be a division between two cultures, one English educated and the other Odia. I have come across parents with children studying in English medium schools not wanting their wards to even speak in Odia”, Das said.

Anushka averred this phenomenon is not restricted to Odisha only. Wherever you go, situation is the same. People are not reading in their own language. “I could not do it as I grew up in Mumbai, not my own State of Kerala. But you are lucky in Odisha, which has rich literary heritage. Read in your own language and discover the treasures”, she told the youngsters.

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