Ringing in the Tuesday with a blog post about something that is not very fashionable to talk about at the moment. Colloquialism is something we are all guilty of, but we are often unaware of having indulged in it. With ours being a country of diverse regional pools and having multiple language influences, it is only normal when the occasional 'yaar' or 'abey' creeps into our conversations without us even realising it. It is now even considered to cool to incorporate such slangs in your speech and informal texting language. What I love about the colloquial language is that it is our own and it gives us a sense of familiarity and comfort when we converse in it that the regular spoken english just can not.
Why this rant about colloquial language all of a sudden? Because one of our dearest 'regular use' words has left the echelons of colloquial language and joined the supremes. Yes! I am talking about the word 'AIYOH!'
Last week, Oxford dictionary released its list of new September words and it featured new entries like Yogasana and our beloved Aiyoh! To be honest, it does not really matter much to the aam junta but to the Indian purists who swear by the Oxford dictionary like a holy scripture, this is a big moment. By adding this word to the official Oxford records, the word now stands to get more acceptance.
More than anything, I am afraid of the misuse that 'Aiyoh' will be put to from now on. It is going to be used a lot more by that pretentious group of people in a party who sip on cocktails named after tools and talk about boycotting Chinese products while taking selfies on an iPhone that was incidentally assembled in China. And the next time Chetan Bhagat0 gets picked on for writing shit in the name of literature, they will point us to that one paragraph in their books where they used 'Aiyoh' : even before the word got picked up by the Oxford dict. "I am a visionary" he will claim. And what a sad day for Indian literature that will be. Arnab Goswami will use it in the course of time, driving us up the wall. The innocence of the word will eventually get lost in the maddening frenzy and what was just an adorable way to express exasperation will boil down to being a word like any other.
For us regular Lucys, there is just the one upside that comes out of this move from the Oxford dict. New word to make on the Scrabble board! Yay.
 |
| source: www.indianmeme.com |
Why this rant about colloquial language all of a sudden? Because one of our dearest 'regular use' words has left the echelons of colloquial language and joined the supremes. Yes! I am talking about the word 'AIYOH!'
Last week, Oxford dictionary released its list of new September words and it featured new entries like Yogasana and our beloved Aiyoh! To be honest, it does not really matter much to the aam junta but to the Indian purists who swear by the Oxford dictionary like a holy scripture, this is a big moment. By adding this word to the official Oxford records, the word now stands to get more acceptance.
More than anything, I am afraid of the misuse that 'Aiyoh' will be put to from now on. It is going to be used a lot more by that pretentious group of people in a party who sip on cocktails named after tools and talk about boycotting Chinese products while taking selfies on an iPhone that was incidentally assembled in China. And the next time Chetan Bhagat0 gets picked on for writing shit in the name of literature, they will point us to that one paragraph in their books where they used 'Aiyoh' : even before the word got picked up by the Oxford dict. "I am a visionary" he will claim. And what a sad day for Indian literature that will be. Arnab Goswami will use it in the course of time, driving us up the wall. The innocence of the word will eventually get lost in the maddening frenzy and what was just an adorable way to express exasperation will boil down to being a word like any other.
For us regular Lucys, there is just the one upside that comes out of this move from the Oxford dict. New word to make on the Scrabble board! Yay.
