Sociolinguistics of Hindī
An Analysis of TV-Mediated Spoken Hindī Features Through TV Programmes’ Language
abstract
This paper analyses varieties of Hindī language differentiated on the social ground, namely standard Hindī (the sanskritized language) and non-standard Hindī. The latter, which includes different varieties of spoken Hindī, was studied listening to two TV programs: Delhi Crime and Satyamev Jayate. Several features were observed on every level, but here the focus is on syntax (Hindī word order) and lexicon (code-switching). Information structure theory and pragmatics are used to analyse TV-mediated spoken Hindī word order. The comprehension of these special features can be helpful to predict the changes towards which Hindī tends to move and to give examples of the spoken language.
Keywords: word order • Spoken Hindī • Hindī varieties • Standard Hindī • Code-switching