| Hamari Boli | |
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 Hindi-Urdu Reinvented! | |
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Names |
Hindustani, Hindi-Urdu, Hindi, Urdu |
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Spoken in |
Primarily India and Pakistan but widely understood and practically serves the Lingua Franca function across South Asia and among Desi Diaspora worldwide. Also widely spoken in various other countries in the Middle East, Europe and the Americas as a result of South Asian immigration |
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Region |
South Asia -- India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nepal, Bhutan, Maldives, Srilanka, Afghanistan |
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Language Family |
Indo-European
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Official status |
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Regulated by |
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Language codes |
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Welcome <> Khush Aamdeed <> Swaagatam
Welcome to Hamari Boli Wiki, the central hub of all activities and happenings under The Hamari Boli Initiative, a full-scale Language Planning & Open-source develpment enterprise operating as a not-for-profit Social Enterprise at the intersection of applied & computational linguistics, open-source, persuasive tech, intercultural awareness and public diplomacy, being executed and implemented as a wiki-based open-source collaborative which everyone on internet can access and contribute to absolutely free 24x7! All Content, Data and Documentation resulting from various HBI activities, programs and projects is forever free, open-source and licenced under Creative Commons BY-SA.
Currently in Alpha stage, we're setting up the space and inviting Enthusiasts, Scholars, Academics, Wikians, Bloggers, Developers, Designers, Researchers, Writers, Poets, Students, Professionals, Universities, Institutions, Companies, Foundations and Associations etc for formal/informal collaboration on various activities and projects under the larger Hamari Boli Initiative.
Though not open for public editing yet, the Wiki is live and accessible to everyone on internet. Will be opening for public editing on 1st January 2015. Currently we're in the process of;
- Setting up this Wiki
- Elaborating and documenting various project areas
- Enlisting volunteers
- Constituting working committees & various editorial, admin, design, dev teams, support groups etc
- Forming partnerships and alliances with various related groups, organizations, institutions etc
In the following lines, we hope to convince you of the necessity, urgency and utility of Hindi-Urdu reform and modernization. Hope you find it all a one-of-a-kind endeavour and join us in bringing the Open-source revolution to South Asia. Register here to express your endorsement and join us in any of the many roles identified below. You can also help us reach most people by liking/following us on Facebook, Twitter, Google+ etc and by sharing this page on your wall/timeline.
Hamare Forums are where we come together to discuss and organize various programs, projects and issues. All distinct projects and program areas have separate forums. Stop by the Watercooler for general discussion, and visit the Help desk for help regarding how to use this wiki.
Being a crowd-powered (crowd-sourced & crowd-funded) enterprise, your feedback is most crucial in determining the right course, finetuning approach and methods, and figuring out what works and what doesnt. Please let us know what you think about Hamari Boli and Hamari Boli Initiative by leaving your comments, critique, suggestions and advice at the Watercooler.
What is "Hamari Boli"?
- Main article: Hamari Boli
"Hamari Boli" (Our Language) is the new name of Hindi-Urdu, the Lingua Franca of South Asia & Desis worldwide. With dozens of mutually intelligible local variants, and over 1 Billion 1st and 2nd language speakers, it is the second most spoken language in the world!
Hamari Boli is the most widely used language for everyday communication among the common-folk across India and Pakistan and the Desi diaspora worldwide. It is the everyday apolitical lingo used by close to a billion South Asians to communicate across borders and cultures. UAE is the best example of the South Asian lingua franca status of Hamari Boli. In Dubai, Hamari Boli is the language that 4 construction workers from Dhaka, Lahore, Mumbai and Kathmandu use to communicate with each other, tho it’s not first language for any of them.
As the most widely spoken language across South Asia and among 50Million+ Desi diapsora worldwide, Hamari Boli is the living testament to the diversity and inclusive spirit of the South Asian Sub-Continent, gratefully acknowledging the richness and diverse unity of the Desi Culture as evident in the meticulous amalgamation of indigenous and foreign cultures from the early Indus Valley Civilization to later Aryan settlers to the Middle Vedic Civilizations to the Afghan and Turkic period to the British Raj to modern Day India, Pakistan, Bangladesh -entire South Asia indeed- and the Diaspora Desis and their descendants spread all over the world.
Simply put, Hamari Boli is reinvented & modernized Hindi-Urdu written in Roman alphabet, with a combined vocabulary drawn from both Standard Hindi and Urdu, regional desi languages, with generous helpings of English as exemplified by "Hamara Cinema", i.e. world's most prolific cinema, The Bollywood :)
What is the Hamari Boli Initiative?
- Main articles: Hamari Boli Initiative, Open Language Planning
Positioned as a social enterprise at the intersection of applied linguistics, open-source, persuasive tech, intercultural awareness and public diplomacy, the larger "Hamari Boli Initiative" is;
"A full-scale People-to-People Communication+Collaboration and Language planning, Prescription, Description, Documentation & Preservation Enterprise aimed at 'Hindi-Urdu' Script, Style, Status & Lexical reform and modernization encompassing all four LP Domains, simultaneously creating Open source P2P collaboration platforms for Indo-Pak peace and confidence building".
| Domain | Objective | Approach |
| Script | Resolving Devanagari-Nastaliq Digraphia | Graphization (Romanization) |
| Style | Minimizing Low-brow / High-brow Diglossia | Simplified language accessible to widest possible audience as exemplified by Bollywood |
| Status | South Asian / Desi Lingua Franca |
|
| Lexical | Lexical expansion & modernization |
|
Besides being a bonafide Applied Linguistics enterprise, Hamari Boli is also an apolitical initiative to;
- Finally ENABLE opensource collaboration --otherwise IMPOSSIBLE-- among Devanagari, Nastaliq & Roman readers
- Create People-to-People Communication & Collaboration Platforms where Desi scholars, researchers, academics, students, professionals and everyone interested cooperate in real time on crowd-powered and open-source endeavors of equal importance to all Desis.
- Reunite the Desi Lingua Franca facilitating cross communication across borders and bring Desi people from around the world together in cooperative endeavor for the benefit of all.
- Provide an apolitical environment to scholars and researchers to observe & study popular interaction, analyze sentiments, identify best practices, report problem areas and suggest solutions.
- Create framework, platforms and pronounced impetus for open-source development in Hamari Boli (Text, Media, Software)
- Promote and popularize FREE self education, peer-to-peer learning, open-source educational content, media, software and emerging educational tech and lowcost delivery models.
- Document the full range of Hamari Boli as spoken across South Asia (Wiki based Audio-Video archive)
- Digitally preserve the rich Hindi-Urdu literature in Roman (wiki based transcription and archiving)
The "Aazaad Standard"
- Main article: Aazaad Standard
Aazaad means Free/Open/Liberated in Hindi-Urdu. Open-source can also be translated as Aazaad in Hindi-Urdu. Aazaad Standard is conceptualized as the 21st century standardized register of Hindi-Urdu i.e. Hamari Boli. Since everything about the HB Initiative is opensource, the very Standard and Romanization scheme i.e. the foundations of entire enterprise are also opensource/aazaad for everyone.
Although Hamari Boli embraces the whole Hindi-Urdu spectrum, including all three scripts, i.e. Devangari, Nastaliq & Roman; Based on our experience at various platforms (such as Khan Academy Hamari Boli ), we are following, advocating and prescribibg some guidelines for language used in mass media and education, this is what we call the Aazaad Standard for Hindi-Urdu. and it encompasses three major language planning domains i.e;
Lexicon & Style:
- Use neutral vocab (Hindustani) as much as possible (like Bollywood) as in "Nahaana" for 'Bathing' instead of Standard Urdu 'Ghusl Karna' & Standard Hindi 'Ashnaan karna'
- Use English words wherever more familiar (as in 'School' for Urdu 'Maktab' and Hindi 'Vidyala') or wherever a common word is not available.
- All technical terms (science, maths etc) should be exclusively as per internationally recognized English conventions. e.g. Maths or Mathematics (even tho a common neutral word is available i.e. 'Hisaab' in addition to Urdu 'Ilm-e Riyazi' and Hindi 'Ganit Vidya' )
Script:
- Preferably written in Standard English Alphabet, equally accessible to Devanagari, Nastaliq & Roman readers/writers alike.
Aazaad Scheme for Hindi-Urdu Romanization
- Main article: Aazaad Scheme for Hindi-Urdu Romanization
Roman alphabet have been used for writing/learning Hindi-Urdu since 1700s. In 1796, Dr. John Borthwick Gilchrist published the first ever grammer of The Hindustani Language in English by the title, "A Grammar, of the Hindoostanee Language ". Since then there's a well established history of Hindi-Urdu publications in Roman alphabet. Throughout the 1800s uptil 1947, hundreds of works inclduding scores of Grammars and Dictionries were published by pioneer linguists and philologists like Dr. Gilchrist, J. T. Platt, Duncan Forbes etc using several romanization schemes. Most of the earlier schemes used diacritics to map indic phonemes to roman graphemes. There was even a Roman Urdu Society in late 1800s which published a regular journal advocating Romanization of Urdu -the then official language of British India- by the name of Roman Urdu Journal with the stated agenda, "To Advocate the Use of Roman Alphabet in Oriental Languages"
One of the earliest inspirations behind HBI was the Uddin_and_Begum_Urdu-Hindustani_Romanization scheme developed and proposed by late Syed Fasih Uddin & Quader Unissa Begum. The Uddin-Begum Scheme is so far the only standard which specifically aims to address Hindustani Language. Several modern systems such as ITRANS have been around for a while too, however, no one system or standard has gained wide currency since there's no 'official' attention. Both Survey of India and Survey of Pakistan use simpilified Hunterian Transliteration System for Indic Romanization. General people intuitively follow the coventions evolved out of the application of hunterian scheme to the local accent of Hamari Boli.
For now, we'll be starting with a modified and simplified hybrid of the Hunterian and Uddin-Begum schemes, involving only standard English Alphabet, available on every keyboard & keypad. However, since the very idea is "Open Language Planning", other suitable schemes and suggestions will also be evaluated and deliberated at project wiki. Through community input and collaboration, we hope to refine and evolve an even more detailed system over time.
Please see main article Aazaad Scheme for Hindi-Urdu Romanization for current version.
Why Romanize?
- Main articles: Romanization of Hindi-Urdu, 'Aazaad Scheme for Hindi-Urdu Romanization
Roman Hindi-Urdu is already in vogue and newer generations are all comfortable using it on web, IMs and SMS -Indians & Pakistanis send over 100Million SMSs daily in Roman-. Some specific arguments are;
- Too much money and efforts are being wasted trying to address one of the two scripts. The extreme Hindi-Urdu digraphia essentially means doing the same thing twice! Font support, content production is always limited to one or the other script. With the neutralized Roman script, Hamari Boli will serve both Devanagari and Nastaliq readers thus freeing resources which can be pooled to produce much greater and better content. For example, a Hamari Boli Wikipedia!
- By neutralizing the script, Hamari Boli will solve the illegibility problem and will make written Hindi-Urdu perfectly mutually legible thus making Hindi-Urdu press and works of Hindi and Urdu writers accessible to readers across both sides of the border.
- Any kind of text based open source collaboration between Devanagari & Nastaliq readers is IMPOSSIBLE until and unless Hindi-Urdu is romanized
- The difficulty of writing: QWERTY keyboards are designed specifically for Roman Alphabet, it is very difficult to type Nastaliq and Devanagari.
- Since both Nastaliq and Devanagari are calligraphic styles, they suffer from legibility problems on computer/mobile screens.
- Young generations: Both in India and Pakistan, the younger generations are all comfortable using Roman for electronic communication (Internet/SMS) and increasingly in writing.
- Diaspora Desis: There are well over 50Million immigrants from sub-continent around the world. Many later generation Desis can understand Hindi-Urdu very well but can’t read or write in default scripts.
Why are we doing it?
- Main article: Why Hamari Boli?
Regardless of any political and communal sensitivities, the case for Hamari Boli is primarily motivated by the Utilitarian principle i.e
"Maximum Good for the Maximum Numbers".
Hindi-Urdu is actually one and the same language divided artificially for socio-cultural and politico-religious motivations. But this knowledge is not popular understanding and to this day, the divide plays a major role in communal identification in Indo-Pak. However, linguistics by & large is in agreement over their joint status. We're working to bridge the divide by bringing the whole range of Hindi-Urdu together (as spoken across India, Pakistan, greater South Asia and the 50Million+ Desi Diaspora) using roman script to develop & promote a neutral writing style accessible to widest Desi audience, as exemplified by Bollywood and popular media.
We're of the opinion that;
The real value and significance of Hindi-Urdu is in its being the Lingua Franca of the South Asian Subcontinent which is home to 1.7 Billion Desis, speaking 400+ languages, using 20+ distinct writing systems -- It is grave injustice and gross disservice to limit Hamari Boli's role, scope, status and appeal for petty communal/national motivations.
Per established Linguistic Standard, "Hindi-Urdu" (taken as one word) is the standard modern term for the erstwhile Hindustani, which was the official language and lingua franca of the British India. Hindi-Urdu(Hindustani) has 4 standardized registers (i.e. subsets);
- Standard Hindi (Shuddha/Manak/Nagari Hindi - The Official Language of India. Written in Devanagari. Heavily sanscritized and purged of all Persian, Turkic, Arabic heritage)
- Standard Urdu (Saaf/Salees Urdu - The Official Language of Pakistan. Written in Nastaliq. Heavily Persianized -and being actively Arabized these days- and purged of most Sanskrit and Prakrit heritage)
- Dakhini (spoken in and around the Deccan plateue. written in Devanagari and Nastaliq both, called Hindi/Urdu respectively)
- Rekhta
Before 1947, Hindi / Urdu / Hindustani all were used synonymously to refer to one and the same language which was written in Nastaliq(predominantly) & Devanagari both. This is called "Digraphia" where a language is written in more than one script (a recognized socio-linguistic affliction) for reasons other than linguistic (cultural, political, religious, ethnic etc). Today, despite all government efforts, "Hindi-Urdu" (NOT Shudh Hindi or Saaf Urdu) is the everyday speech of native speakers, popular media and the Lingua Franca of Indo-Pak and all of South Asia indeed. called Urdu or Hindi respectively when written in Nastaliq or Devanagari. In addition to Digraphia, Hindi-Urdu also suffers from Diglossia which is yet another major sociolinguistic affliction resulting from linguistic elitism. It refers to situations where two varieties of one language are used by a single language community. In addition to the community's everyday or vernacular language variety (labeled "L" or "low" variety), a second, highly codified variety (labeled "H" or "high") is used in certain situations such as literature, government communication (documents, state media), or other specific settings, but not used for everyday conversation, mass education and mass media.
In case of 'Hindi-Urdu';
- In Pakistan -- 'Standard(Saaf) Urdu' is the "High" variety, whereas 'Hindi-Urdu' is the "Low" variety used by the masses (called Urdu, written in Nastaliq and increasingly in Roman).
- In India, both 'Standard(Shudh) Hindi' and 'Standard(Saaf) Urdu' are the "H" varieties (written in devanagari & Nastaliq respectively), whereas 'Hindi-Urdu' is the "L" variety used by the masses and written in both Devanagari and Nastaliq (and called Hindi or Urdu resectively) as well as in Roman (electronic comm).
Hindi-Urdu diglossia can be best contrasted with the Arabic situation where Modern Standard Arabic is the Official Language (the "H" variety) in all Arabic speaking countriesin West Asia & North Africa but the regional mass vernacular is one or the other dialect (various 'L' varieties). in fact, linguists argue that the different 'Varieties of Arabic' show far greater variation than 'Hindi-Urdu' (even to the point of mutual unintelligibility). But still, all these varieties are classified and recognized as dialects of Arabic. Similarly, Standard Hindi and Standard Urdu should be treated as two "High" varieties of 'Hindi-Urdu' and thus not suited for use in media intended for mass consumption by people from 400+ speech subgroups (using 20+ distinct writing systems). for example, Hindi Cinema will lose 99% of its viewership if it were to use Shudh Hindi.
The Case for HamariBoli ('Hindi-Urdu') is partly inspired by Modern Simplified Chinese(Standard Mandarin) where Classical Chinese (the "H" variety) was successfully replaced with vernacular Mandarin during the New Culture Movement . Today, Standard Mandarin has become a fully developed lingua franca of mainland China, Taiwan and Singapore, most spoken language in the world and is also one of only 6 official UN languages.
Enabling Open Text Collaboration
- Main article: Hindi-Urdu's Open Dilemma
Being the Desi Lingua franca, Hamari Boli (natural Hindi-Urdu in Roman) is the only option to reach all Desis equally. However, the crippling Devanagari-Nastaliq Digraphia renders any kind of Opensource collaboration IMPOSSIBLE among Devanagari/Nastaliq/Roman writers unless each collaborator knows all three scripts. Hamari Boli resolves the dilemma by using neutral Roman script to create equally accessible opensource content and thus, for the first time, enables 'Open Collaboration' among the whole spectrum of Devanagari-Nastaliq-Roman readers & writers.
The 'Open' Opportunity
- Main articles: Open Desi Initiative, Hindi-Urdu's Open Dilemma
Besides resolving the Devanagari-Nastaliq dilemma, Hamari Boli Initiative is also meant to define and create frameworks, platforms and pronounced impetus for open-source development in Hamari Boli (Text, Media, Software)
Opensource and Internet in general is an invaluable blessing in the acute scarcity of non-partisan and propaganda free information. Uncontaminated Objective Truth is 'Key' to dissolving propaganda induced prejudices and thus Opensource needs to be leveraged to the fullest to create lasting regional peace & harmony in South Asia. Since all traditional info and education channels are choked with fabricated myths, half-truths and exclusivist hyperbole, Internet as 'The Medium' and Opensource as 'The Method' is 'The Solution' to all the misinformation and educational challenges facing all South Asian nations.
Internet penetration is growing at breakneck speed and the region already boasts 160Million+ internet users (150M in Indo-Pak alone) and the numbers are expected to at least triple by 2015 as smartphones are becoming evercommon! However, The Opensource opportunity is almost entirely neglected in Indo-Pak. Free, open-source textbooks like FlexBooks, content like Wikipedia, Instructional Media & evalutation tech like the Khan Academy are most promising approaches to ensure same quality education to everyone, everywhere at a fraction of cost and hassle than what the traditional system requires.
We believe that the digital age has presented us Desis with an unprecedented opportunity in the form of "Instructional Media + Educational Technology + Open-Source Content Production & Delivery Model" which is inherently immune to establishment bias and most suitable for filtering status-quo lies with dispassionate, non-partisan scholarly analysis. Uncontaminated Objective Truth is 'Key' to dissolving propaganda induced prejudices and thus we must leverage Open-Source to the fullest to create lasting regional peace & harmony in South Asia. We're keenly working towards creating a framework and pronounced impetus for open-content in Hamari Boli, which in turn will also hopefully inspire similar initiatives in other Desi languages. One loftiest long-term goal of the HB Initiative is a Hamari Boli Wikipedia :)
Indo-Pak conflict is the most explosive nuclear threat today. A major problem in bilateral relations is extremely negative sentiments among common-folk, largely due to establishment propaganda & lack of popular interaction. Cross border travel is a nightmare, due to state policies. Nonpolitical cross border P-to-P platforms are vital to enable maximum people interact freely. The Open-Source approach will also enable large-scale People-to-People Communication and Collaboration. Better public acquaintance will result in reduced negative sentiments & reduced support for militarism.
Serving as the platform, the larger Hamari Boli Initiative will set the stage for Opensource Curricula and Textbooks in Hamari Boli. Most significantly, a Hamari Boli translation of English Wikipedia will be an invaluable source of neutral and objective scholarly info on any topic. Will arouse great competition –and thus communication-- from all sides which will ultimately result in premium quality encyclopedic content in Hamari Boli, replicated in other regional languages as well.
Bridging the English Medium / Hindi-Urdu Medium Apartheid
Worst victim of the unholy divide is the public education system, particularly in North India & Pakistan, where on one hand, the ruling elite have deliberately kept Hindi and Urdu -and all other regional languages- fossilized in the name of faux nationalism and on the other, created 'several' parallel English-medium schooling systems that ensure that the best positions always go to the elite, middle order to middle-class and only lower level to Hindi/Urdu medium masses..
Any attempts at reform and modernization are always frowned upon, with zealots going as far as denouncing any efforts as anti-national and thus Hindi and Urdu are condemned to remain forever stunted and identified with social and economic backwardness. The hegemony is so pervasive that even private initiatives, where there can be no establishment influence are marred by linguistic chauvinism of Hindi and Urdu zealots. Hindi and Urdu Wikipedias are live evidence of what is being done with Hindi and Urdu, both use some alien language that nobody speaks! being a voluntary undertaking, Wikipedia relies on the good sense of the language community. in case of Hindi and Urdu, the conditioning has been so effective that the very people that should be changing things have self-appointed themselves as defenders of status-quo. What good is an encyclopedia if no one can understand it? The same travesty that happened to our text books is now happening to open-source! Both Hindi and Urdu Wikipedias are largely advertising the 'Official Story' instead of dispassionate objective truth that is the Wiki standard. This is absolute mockery of the open-knowledge idea!
We aim to bridge the divide by producing open text books for primary and secondary standards in modernized Hamari Boli i.e. the language of instruction being used in an average English medium school anywhere in North India and Pakistan
Status recognition
- Main articles: Desi, Languages of South Asia
We are of the opinion that the politically motivated division of The Hindustani Language as Hindi & Urdu was an epic injustice and disservice to the language and 1Billion+ speakers.The deliberate disseverance of literary canon, forced sanskritization and persianization, super-enforced with extreme digraphia has on one hand resulted in depriving the speakers of almost half of their very own linguistic heritage and on the other exacerbated anti Hindi-Urdu sentiments in Bangladesh, India, Nepal and Pakistan! Reuniting and rebranding Hindi-Urdu as Hamari Boli will also help assert its neutral, shared & inclusive lingua franca status and will hopefully lead to reducing the anti Hindi-Urdu sentiment.
We believe that the artificial Hindi-Urdu divide is detrimental to greater South Asian interest as it severely limits the reach and accessibility of the language. The peculiar brands of Hindi and Urdu (the so-called 'Standard') manufactured as national languages in India and Pakistan since partition are patently un-natural as they do not represent the language as it is held by the people but are solely based on the establishments' ideal of the national language. The interest of the people will be far better served if the efforts and money being wasted on addressing either of the two scripts are invested in creating and promoting content accessible to all Hindi-Urdu speakers alike. Testimony to the argument is the fact that both 'Official Hindi' and 'Official Urdu' can only be found in text books and official speeches. Popular Hindi-Urdu is essentially the same (except for the script) across India & Pakistan (and among the worldwide Desi diaspora) and that is what we call Hamari Boli, the lingua franca of the Desi People!
South Asia is home to 1.7Billion Desis and 400+ regional languages, written using 20+ distinct writing systems. Just like Mandarin, Hamari Boli is the most widely spoken and used language in the Indo-Pak subcontinent and With 1Billion+ speakers worldwide, ranks only 2nd to Mandarin. Just as Arabic is the language of the Arab World, Hamari Boli is the lingua franca of the Desi World. Not just Indo-Pak but entire South Asia indeed i.e. India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nepal, Bhutan, Maldives, Mauritius, Srilanka, Afghanistan and the 50Mn+ Desi Diaspora worldwide. The very name "Hamari Boli" (Our Langauge) is neither Shudh Hindi nor Saaf Urdu and brings an air of familiarity for all desis and reinforces the idea of it being "The Desi Lingua Franca".
In light of the above, Hamari Boli undeniably deserves being adopted as the 7th Official UN Language. We're petitioning the UN in this regard, undertaking and offering full assistance in terms of funds and all the many project needs. To the end, we're setting up a formal consortium dedicated to HB adoption, strongly urging and inviting all SAARC governements to join the "Desi Consortium for Hamari Boli", the formal body constituted to pursue, advocate and promote the case for Hamari Boli to be adopted as an official UN language alongside Arabic, Chinese (Mandarin), English, French, Russian & Spanish.
What are we doing & How are we doing it?
- Main article: Hamare Projects
As evident from details, the larger Hamari Boli Initiative is conceived as a perpetual enterprise striving towards the goals and objectives outlined above. Starting with Phase-I, several ventures and activities are undertaken and several more are planned and will be floated in due course. Longerm roadmap is divided among successive milestones and phases.
Phase I
- Hamari Boli Wiki
- English-to-HamariBoli Wiktionary (10k words)
- Hamara Translator
- Desi Answers
- Peace.HamariBoli.com
- Desi Consortium for Hamari Boli
Hamari Boli Wiki
- Main article: Hamari Boli Wiki
Hamari Boli Wiki is the nerve center of all activities, projects, ventures undertaken as part of HB Initiative. As the online hub of all activity, the HB Wiki is the platform where all action happens.
We chose Wikia as it is the most advanced platform with ideal features and excellent support needed to execute an enterprise of this mammoth magnitude. Some important features;
- 1-click sign-up/sign-in and built-in sharing with Facebook
- Contributor Profiles and Blogs
- Discussion Forums, Message Walls & Talk Pages
- Acheivement Badges
- Q & A Wiki
- Extensive Help Documentation
- Built-in CC Licencing
- Real-time group chat
Currently in Alpha stage, we're setting up the space and inviting Enthusiasts, Scholars, Academics, Wikians, Bloggers, Developers, Designers, Researchers, Students, Professionals, Universities, Institutions, Companies and Associations etc for formal/informal collaboration on various activities and projects under the larger Hamari Boli Initiative.
Though not yet open for public editing, the Wiki is live and accessible to everyone on internet. Will be opening for public editing on 1st January 2013. Currently we're in the process of;
- Setting up this Wiki
- Elaborating and documenting various project details.
- Enlisting volunteers
- Constituting working committees and various editorial, admin, design, dev teams, support groups etc.
- Forming partnerships and alliances with various related groups, organizations, institutions etc.
Desi WordNet
- Main article: Desi WordNet
Conceptualized as the definitive Lexical Database / Digital Corpus of Hamari Boli, along the lines of Princeton WordNet and Oxford English Corpus, Desi WordNet is the back-bone of HB Initiative. The ultimate objective is creating the most exhaustive lexical resource for all things Hamari Boli, such as Dictionaries, Corpus, Thesaurus etc.
English-to-Hamari Boli Wiktionary v1.0
Roman Hindi-Urdu is already in vogue and the newer generations are all comfortable using it on web, IMs and SMS -Indians & Pakistanis send over 100Million SMSs daily in Roman-. However, the problem is that there's no standardization and for any standard to be widely agreed upon, there needs to be significant content in it. What better than a Dictionary? An ideal match for the obvious reason that it has the most popular appeal. There are over 150Million internet users in the region (and 50Million+ diaspora) and Google Trends reports 5Million+ 'Dictionary' related searches each month from Indo-Pak! The numbers are only expected to grow in foreseeable future. Who wouldn't just love quality, free dictionaries :)
Therefore, our first undertaking is the Hamari Boli Dictionaries Project, idea is to compile open-source Hamari Boli Dictionaries on this wiki (Eng-to-HB, HB-to-Eng, HB-to-HB, HB-to-Major World Languages, HB-to-Major Regional Languages) and publish in collaboration with Wikimedia Foundation at hb.Wiktionary.org! Having words and meanings of words from both modern Hindi and Urdu in roman script, readers of Devanagari, Perso-Arabic and Roman scripts will all benefit equally.
For example, the entry for "Knowledge" will be;
- Knowledge
- = Ilm
- = Daanish
- = Idraak
- = Vidyaa
- = Gyaan
- Knowledge
As above, the full range of Hindi-Urdu is being brought together. All English words have all meanings in Hindi and Urdu. By using the Roman alphabet, it will be accessible to both Nastaliq and Devanagari readers alike and will also be an invaluable resource for new learners of Hamari Boli (Hindi-Urdu).
Version 1: Starting out with 30k+ words compiled by Mr.Waseem Siddiqui, to be transcribed as per Aazad Scheme. We intend to seed version 1.0 with 100k words. Depending on community interest and contribution, the dictionary will keep on expanding like Wikitionary (English Wikitionary at en.wikitionary.org now boasts 2 million plus entries!). New features such as mobile packs, human pronunciation, etymologies, part of speech, synonyms, antonyms, specialized dictionaries etc and support for regional Desi languages and other major world languages will be added in later versions.
Hamara Translator
The web version will not be available offline. Enabling offline access will require a client application like Babylon and Lingoes Translator. Hamara Translator is conceptualized as a 1-Click Desktop Dictionary Look-up Application for offline and program independent access to above published dictionary. Just as Babylon, it will enable instant point n click lookup functionality for any word, anywhere on screen, online AND offline!
Dictionary packs i.e. updates, specialized dictionaries (legal, medical, financial... -- based on wiki) etc. will be released regularly to be used with Hamara Translator.
Hamara Literature
Weighing the current trends, argument can be made that all world languages are being romanized. The process is neither controllable nor reversible. Already waning, it wont be far-fetched to imagine a future where new generations wont recognize neither Devanagari nor Nastaleeq. If that is what is to happen eventually, we must start preserving our literary heritage by transcribing to Roman NOW!
"Hamara Literature" is a straight-forward wiki-based digital preservation platform consisting of simply transcribing Devanagari-Nastaliq works to roman and publishing on this Wiki. Starting with public domain works such as Alif-Laila, Bagho-Bahar, Fasana-e Azad, Kabeer and Nazeer Akbar Abadi's works, over time we aim to digitize entire public domain Hindi-Urdu literature. Will be later extended with a collaborative literary history of Hamari Boli.
Shades of Hamari Boli
A wiki based audio-visual speech corpus of Hamari Boli, documenting and preserving all the many different accents and styles of Hindi-Urdu spoken across South Asia and Desi diaspora worldwide. The inspiration for this came from Amir Khan's groundbreaking and landmark show Satya Mev Jayate where scores of participants from across India recounted their experiences in their native accent and style of Hamari Boli. Besides being phenomenally remarkable in all respects, SMJ content is also invaluable from a linguistic perspective. Ideally, we'd like to start with clips from SMJ Season 1 published on this wiki in "Shades of Hamari Boli" categroy with standard speech corpus data. For this we need permission and would like to request the great Amir Khan and SMJ team on behalf of all Desis to consider releasing season 1 content, research and data under Creative Commons and offer full assistance in open-sourcing the SMJ revolution.
Desi Peace Stimulus
- Main article: Desi Peace Stimulus
Indo-Pak conflict is the most explosive nuclear threat in the world today. The decades long vendettea is the result of cunning cultivation of enmity thru Education and Media by the establishment and political class. A major problem in bilateral relations is extremely negative sentiments among common-folk, due to establishment propaganda & lack of popular interaction, which the hawks on both sides exploit for political gain. Cross border travel is a nightmare, due to state policies. However, with the spread of mobiles, internet and television, the information stranglehold by establishments is no longer possible and newer generations of Pakistanis and Indians are slowly waking up to reality.
People-to-People communication is an entirely new phenomenon in the context of Indo-Pak relations and is gaining momentum since 2008. The South Asian Region --Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan, Sri Lanka-- is home to about 1.7Billion people and is one of the fastest growing economic regions with more than 60% population under 25. More than 60% mobile penetration and IT is booming everywhere. India is one of the BRICS nations, and since 2000s, the general economic growth have created a very large urban middle class that is eager to change old politics, willing to look beyond the status quo, optimistic about the fruits of modernization and economic growth and also ever more equipped with tools to voice their opinion and drive large-scale social and economic change.
Social Media and internet in general has already changed how common indians and pakistanis connect and communicate directly. More than 175,000 indians and pakistanis interact daily on Facebook alone, something that was unimaginable only a few years back as cross-border travel has been almost impossible since at least 1965. The civil society on both sides has been very responsive and should be aplauded for seizing the opportunity in time and taking initiatives for creating dialogue across the board. Organizations and initiatives like Aman ki Asha, IPSS and Romancing the Border are most energetically creating awareness and platforms to articulate and propagate the case for Indo-Pak friendship and coopereation.
Another important feature of the trend is the level of diaspora engagement, who in general have better intercultural exposure and are more connected and active on social media. The 50Million+ South Asian diaspora is the 2nd largest after Chinese, and has become a significant force in its own right. With social media and open-source, they are far better informed and equipped with tools to contribute in more active and positive roles towards the shared goal of regional development and security by promoting and popularizing greater South Asian awareness and solidarity.
All of the above creates a very conductive, promising and optimistic environment for creating political will by shaping and driving popular opinion in favour of normalizing ties between India and Pakistan. In this age of Media and hyper-connectivity, public opinion is most crucial in shaping government policies, therefore, in our opinion, public diplomacy is the single most significant contributor in determining the future of the nascent wave of goodwill, what we call the Desi Peace Stimulus. We believe that now is the time to expand the scope and reach of the budding Indo-Pak peace stimulus by inviting and involving all South Asian nations and channelling into a Pan South Asian Peoples Movement for greater regional security and economic development. With various ventures and initiatives under HB initiative, we aim to facilitate and nurture the invaluable trend by;
- Advocating and promoting the case for Indo-Pak peace as a prerequisite for overall South Asian development and security.
- Creating opportunities and platforms for people to people communication and collaboration engaging not only Indians & Pakistanis but all Desis equally on open-source ventures of equal value for all.
- Practically visualizing the bountiful future that greater South Asian cooperation and collaboration promises with opensource research media (videos, infographics, animations etc)
- Documenting the entire peace stimulus with Wiki based open-text and audio-visual archives, tracking, analysing and sharing results using Open Data model.
Current initiatives under DPS are;
Seventh Official UN Language
South Asia is home to 1.7Billion Desis and 400+ regional languages, written using 20+ distinct writing systems. Just like Mandarin, Hamari Boli (Hindi-Urdu ) is the most widely spoken and used language in the Indo-Pak subcontinent and With 1Billion+ speakers worldwide, ranks only 2nd to Mandarin. Just as Arabic is the language of the Arab World, Hamari Boli is the lingua franca of the Desi World. Not just Indo-Pak but entire South Asia indeed i.e. India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nepal, Bhutan, Maldives, Mauritius, Srilanka, Afghanistan and the 50Mn+ Desi Diaspora worldwide. The very name "Hamari Boli" (Our Langauge) is neither Shudh Hindi nor Saaf Urdu and brings an air of familiarity for all desis and reinforces the idea of it being "The Desi Lingua Franca". Recognition and adoption of Hamari Boli as the 7th Official UN Language will greatly help creating a pan South Asian awareness leading to greater Desi solidarity.
Besides creating a most prominent identity marker in the assembly of nations, recognition and adoption of Hindi-Urdu as the 7th Official UN Language will also greatly help creating a pan South Asian awareness leading to greater Desi solidarity, especially invigorating the recent people-driven wave of goodwill among Indians and Pakistanis. The nascent phenomena is unprecedented in scale and scope and this recognition will send a very positive message of regional identity to all South Asian nations on behalf the world community.
Desi Consortium for Hamari Boli
In light of the above, Hamari Boli undeniably deserves being adopted as the 7th Official UN Language. We're petitioning the UN in this regard, undertaking and offering full assistance in terms of funds and all the many project needs.
To the end, we're setting up a formal consortium dedicated to HB adoption, strongly urging and inviting all SAARC governements to join the "Desi Consortium for Hamari Boli", the formal body constituted to pursue, advocate and promote the case for Hamari Boli to be adopted as an official UN language alongside Arabic, Chinese (Mandarin), English, French, Russian & Spanish. Register here if you'd like to collaborate .
Kicking off the consortium on the occasion of Indo-Pak's 65th independence anniversary on 14-15th August 2012, with an online petition requesting the United Nations on behalf of all Desis. Please sign and share with everyone you know .
Peace.HamariBoli.com
Sub-domain as part of Stanford Peace Innovation Lab's PeaceDOT initiative. Developed as a portal covering happenings under DPS, here we'll be publishing reports, resources, directories and indexes related to DPS.
Aman Pages
A wikipedia style encyclopedia documenting DPS with articles in Hamari Boli about related organizations, initiatives, publications, individuals, events, projects, ventures etc
Long-term Roadmap
Desi Language Labs
Starting with "Hamara Translator", Desi Language Labs is a language tools development platform, specializing in open source Apps/APIs for use with HB Wiki content & data, Translation & Transliteration engines, language localization software/web tools and services for organizations, companies, institutions and governments.
Hamara Translator v1.0 is DLLs first undertaking, will be extended later into a Complete Applications Suite for seamless & effortless 1-click Dictionary lookup across devices and operating systems with apps for Mobiles, iPads/Tablets, iPhones etc.
As everything else, all content and data is opensource..
Open Desi Initiative
- Main article: Open Desi Initiative
As affirmed above, one of the overarching objectives of the Hamari Boli Initiative is to address the Indo-Pak Education Emergency. We believe that the traditional modes, methods and channels of education are bloated with establishment propaganda and all kind of other bureucratic non-sense. Still almost entirely neglected in Indo-Pak, free, open-source textbooks like FlexBooks, content like Wikipedia, Instructional Media & evalutation tech like the Khan Academy are most promising approaches to ensure same quality education to everyone, everywhere at a fraction of cost and hassle than what the traditional system requires. That is what we hope to accomlish under the ODI banner over next three years with the following;
Desi Educators Network
Online platform for educators, academics, social entrepreneurs, policy makers, students and parents to collaborate towards developing and distributing open-source curricula for primary and secondary students in South Asia.
Open-source Text Books
A hybrid of FlexBooks and Wikibooks models. Neatly organized in curricula format and freely available via internet. Written in a "Modernized Hamari Boli" these textbooks will be arranged such that teachers and students following various primary & secondary curricula will be able to find all material required to master respective curriculum. Initial focus will be completing science subjects for Primary and Secondary standards in Hamari Boli. HB Books will in turn inspire and galvanize similar initiatives among other Desi languages
Language Learning
Proficiency in English language is almost a must for a successful academic and professional career anywhere in South Asia. In recent years, English teaching has become a very profitable business and hundreds of thousands of students spend countless money and efforts into learning it thru overcharged books/media and so-called 'Language Institutes' mushrooming everywhere. We'll be adapting/developing free, open-source books, instructional media (videos, animations etc) and testing platform for English learning in Hamari Boli for all Desi learners. Same model will be replicated rightafter for Hamari Boli learning material
Khan Academy Hamari Boli
Hamari Boli version of the world famous "www.KhanAcademy.org",
Matrix multiplication (part 1) Linear Algebra -- KA Hamari Boli (Hindi-Urdu).mp4
The first ever global classroom, available 24x7 online, absolutely free to everyone, everywhere! already being hailed as "the Next Revolution in Education", Khan Academy brings the best quality education to everyone regardless of cultural or class backgorund..
Ultimate objective is to port the entire English Khan Academy Platform (Videos + Testing + Evaluation + Reporting) to www.KhanAcademyHamariBoli.com for Desi Learners & Teachers worldwide.. just as Khan Academy, Khan Academy Hamari Boli will also be 100% Free & Open-source for everyone, everywhere!
Hamari Boli Wikipedia
Who doesnt love Wikipedia! An invaluable blessing for knowledge seekers everywhere. In fact the HB Initiative started with a very simple idea of translating the English wiki into Roman Hindi-Urdu, research for which led to the genesis of Hamari Boli. HB translation of English Wikipedia is our most goal in the long-run. However, getting there needs the WordNet and Aazaad Standard thoroughly worked out.
Open Invitation for Open Collaboration
HBI is a monumental undertaking depending entirely on volunteer community contribution. Our model relies on intensive collaboration among individuals and organizations from civil society, academia, media and industry. We request and invite all Desis to contribute your bit towards practically demonstrating the bounties promised by greater South Asian collaboration by bringing the open-source revolution to South Asia.
Register here to record your endorsement and join us in any of the many roles and functions identified below. You can also help us reach most people by liking/following us on Facebook, Twitter, Google+ etc and by sharing this page on your walls/profiles/timelines. All contributors will be featured in related categories of the "contributors directory" on this wiki and www.HamariBoli.com -you can always choose to remain anonymous if you prefer-
Hamare Researchers
Formal Masters/Doctoral research papers/theses (Student-Supervisor teams) on any of the various themes and topics covered on this wiki.
Hamare Associates
Academics, scholars, students, professionals, software/web dvelopers, designers, enthusiasts etc interested in contributing to any HB related activity/area in individual capacity. Start and participate in discussions at Hamare Forums to explore various project areas, aspects, requirements etc and record your opinions, inquiries, advice, suggestions etc.
Hamare Partners
Institution, organizations, universities, companies, associations -- organizational collaboration/support on various HB activities. If you represent or are affiliated with an organization that you think would be interested in what we're doing, please share the word and let us know how to reach them.
Hamare Evangelists
Be an HB Evangelist and help us attract most collaborators,partners and patrons. Spread the word about Hamari Boli in your social network, at your school, institution and workplace etc. Start discussions at Hamare Forums to suggest and explore various ways to promote HB.
Hamare Patrons
Individuals and Organizations which support HBI with cash and/or in-kind donations. All Patrons are listed at Hamare Patrons pages at this Wiki and www.HamariBoli.com. Click here to donate now and share this appeal with family, friends and acquaintances.
Hamare Challenges!
Design for us
Create logos, identities, infographics, websites, promotional media such as animations, videos, banners, stickers etc for Hamari Boli and the HB Campaign for UN Adoption. Your contributions will be duly acknowledged and published on this Wiki.
Write about us
HBI needs visibility to reach maximum volunteers and build momentum necessary for success of such enterprise. You can help us by blogging, tweeting and writing about Hamari Boli in the press. All writings will be featured on this wiki and Peace.HamariBoli.com blog.
Compose for us
Compose an anthem for DPS. We're looking for HB lyrics set to the tunes of Lennon's "Give Peace A Chance". Hopefully leading to an original album, you can also contribute songs on the theme of Indo-Pak peace and greater South Asian solidarity. lyrics, audios, videos, animations all are welcome. Entries will be published on this wiki and best ones will be decided by community voting.
Code for us
Join us on SourceForge in developing Hamara Translator.
How's it all funded?
We're all volunteers here. Thats what wikis are about, volunteer powered content! We too hope to get most of the work done with volunteer contribution, however, just like Wikipedia, this is a mammoth undertaking and there are expenses that must be paid in cash
We also need a dedicated team of senior technical, managerial, PR/MR & Fundraising professionals for developing, executing, organizing, implementing, managing, optimizing, popularizing and advancing above projects, programs and ventures. As much as we would want to, these cant be done part-time and nobody can volunteer fulltime.
Till now, most of needed funds are provided by Mr. Ali Mozaffar Jafry who has been most appreciative and supportive of the endeavour since start. Now that we've entered the Alpha stage, we need to raise $20k over next 6 month to advance to Beta. Counting entirely on Individual & Organizational support we plead you to please help us in making it all happen by donating generously as one of Hamare Patrons.
Dedications
Hamara Cinema
Bollywood is perhaps the single most important influence in keeping Hindi-Urdu alive for the masses. When government institutions and communally motivated scholars were viciously victimizing Hamari Boli (sanscritization & arabization), it was Bollywood that became the unsuspecting saviour of popular Hindi-Urdu. With its pan-Desi appeal, Bollywood rightfully deserves the title Hamara Cinema. Among all Desis, those associated with Bollywood are pehaps most likely to acknowledge and appreciate true nature and status of Hamari Boli, the language of world's most prolific cinema.
On the occasion of the 100th anniversary of Bollywood -well yes, of Indian Cinema technically-, we invite everyone associated to endorse Hamari Boli and help HBI thrive.
Ali Mozaffer Jafry
Senior open enthusiast and an avid admirer of Wikipedia, Mr. Jafry's support has been invaluable in getting HBI this far. As a pioneer open philanthropist in Pakistan, Mr. Jafry laments the general neglect of the open opportunity in Pakistan and asks all Desi philathropists to look beyond traditional philanthropic models and channels by investing into technology based social enterprises, most importantly in the area of open-source.
Aman Ki Asha
The phenomenal peace initiative by the Jang Group of Pakistan and Times of India Group of India. Aman Ki Asha is the most prominent and most active platform promoting Indo-Pak peace.
Dr. Tariq Rahman
Hamari Boli would not have been possible without the work of Dr.Rahman. His landmark 2011 book, "From Hindi to Urdu" is the most difinitive history of Hamari Boli to date. His research dealing with various aspects of Hindi-Urdu divide and the role of language politics in Pakistan was most crucial in finetuning the case for Hamari Boli.
Azim H. Premji
A living legend, Mr.Premji is one of the brightest role models for young desis everywhere. HBI is dedicated to Mr.Premji's practical vision of universal primary education across India and what Bill Gates calls 'pioneering leadership' and approach to philanthropy.
Aamir Khan & SMJ Team
HBI's grand approach is directly inspired by Satyamev Jayate's phenomenal scale and impact. We most humbly applaud the great Aamir Khan and the entire SMJ team for educating, inspiring, motivating and mobilizing an entire nation with such a grand and meticulous approach. Keeping in line with the groundbreaking approach, we request Mr.Khan and SMJ team on behalf of all Desis to consider releasing season 1 content, research and data under Creative Commons and offer full assistance in open-sourcing the SMJ revolution.
Jimmy Wales, Mark Shuttleworth, Salman Khan & The Global Open Community
For creating Wikipedia , Ubuntu , Khan Academy and the Open Culture , the game-changing, paradigm shifting revolution comparable only with the invention of Printing Press.