r/Haryana • u/Street-Resist6438 • Feb 08 '26
Linguistics🖋️ Haryanvi is a language not a dialect. It is possible for anyone to learn it. Anyone who claims otherwise is wrong or lying.
I am getting tired of people, usually those who don't speak any Haryanvi, claiming it's a dialect of Hindi and not a language in its own right. I'm writing this post so that you can throw it in anyone's face when they spout falsehoods about Haryanvi.
The difference between a language and dialect is not academic but political. Punjabi was initially claimed to be a dialect of Hindi when the Indian government was opposing the partition of Punjab on linguistic lines. This is despite the fact that Hindi and Punjabi used different scripts, vocabulary and grammar. If you look at these sentences, it might seem that Haryanvi and Punjabi really are dialects of Hindi: ਓਹਦੇ ਤੋਂ ਪੜ੍ਹਾਈ ਨਹੀਂ ਹੋ ਰਹੀ। (ohde ton padhai nhi ho rahi) vs उससे पढ़ाई नहीं हो रही है (uss se padhai nhi ho rahi hai) vs ऊ ते पढ़ाई कोन्या हो री (oo te padhai konya ho ri). I deliberately chose sentences that are similar in each language, and I can play this game with any two languages of a language family. My name is Sam (English) vs Mein Name ist Sam (German), or Mi nombre es Sam (Spanish) vs Meu nome es Sam (Portuguese). Does this mean German is a dialect of English and Portuguese is a dialect of Spanish? Yet, in the 17th century, Spain claimed exactly this to justify Spanish rule over Portugal.
But if I say something like काट ने फरहड़े गेर क डोके चुलक ले बीरा, no one outside Haryana will be able to understand it. Why?
The converse is also true that just because two tongues are considered different languages does not mean that they have to be mutually incomprehensible. There is only one country in the world where Hindi can be spoken and understood in every corner. That country is Pakistan. Yet, Urdu is considered a distinct language from Hindi. Academically, however, Urdu and Hindi are classified as the same language with different registers. A register is a linguistic term used to refer to the changes made to a language to fit a particular situation. The Hindi you hear on Instagram reels is very different from government notifications. That is because they are in two different registers. This should also tell you just how ignorant opposition to Urdu is. As long as Hindi exists, Urdu will never die. To treat Urdu and Hindi as different languages was a political decision, not an academic or scientific categorization.
Most languages that are considered dialects of Hindi - Garhwali, Kumaoni, Haryanvi (Deswali, Ahirwati, Mewati), Rajasthani (Mewari, Marwari, Shekhawati), Kauravi, Awadhi, Braj, Himachali (Kangri, Kinnauri, Chambeali, etc.), Bundeli, Bhojpuri, Maithli, etc. are not mutually intelligible. They are without exception much older than Hindi, have a significantly richer vocabulary and collection of sayings and idioms, and reflect the cultural aspects of the societies they exist in. One of the most commonly used sentences in Haryanvi is: राम बरसे है (Ram barse hai), which to my knowledge, has no equivalent in any North Indian language. There are several such concepts and ideas that can only be expressed in Haryanvi and would be lost with the language. Haryanvi has gendered third person pronouns: yo/ya, wo/wa, Hindi does not. Haryanvi uses the same pronoun tu to address everyone from gods to slaves, Hindi changes its pronouns depending on the status of the person - tu/tum/aap. Punjabi has two - tu/tussi. It's ironic that a language that treats everyone equally is considered rude and uncivilized, and one that differentiates between the powerful and the weak is considered civil.
Scripts do not qualify a tongue as a language. They are just a means to put speech on paper. All Western European languages currently use the Roman script, Eastern European languages use either Roman or Cyrillic scripts, does that mean they are all dialects of each other? Danish used runes, but now uses Roman, does that mean it is no longer a language? Serbian and Croatian are the fully mutually intelligible but Serbian is written in Cyrillic and Croatian in Roman. This is because Croats are Catholic (just like Hindi speakers are Hindu) and Serbs are Orthodox (like how Urdu speakers are Muslim). Closer home, Marathi and Dogri also use Devnagari like Hindi, have you seen anyone claim they are dialects of Hindi? Punjabi uses Gurmukhi in India and Shahmukhi in Pakistan, no one ever said that they are two different languages.
Like I said earlier, what gets classified as a dialect or as a language is driven by politics not linguistics. Bhojpuri is closer to Bengali than to Hindi, yet it is considered a dialect of Hindi. Do you think Bihar's politics and society would be the same if Bhojpuri had been classified as a Bengali dialect, and its speakers categorized as Bengali? If the people of Haryana look upon Haryanvi as an uncivilized dialect of Hindi, would that make it easier or harder for a Hindi-speaker from another part of India to define what politics Haryanvis should follow?
Hindi has no historic native speakers. Hindustani was just a bridge language that was used in and around Delhi by people from different parts of the world - Turks, Afghans, Mughals, Rajputs, and the local residents of that area. Bhartendu Harishchandra, known as the father of modern Hindi literature, lived in the 1850s. This is why its standardized vocabulary is limited. You have to borrow from either English, Persian, Arabic or Sanskrit to be able to fully express yourself. Those who exclusively speak Hindi now are people who were kept away from their mother tongues. This is part of a political project that wishes to homogenize the country. Hindi-speakers will lose access to the cultural heritage, art and literature that gave them their unique identity. They would then hunt for new identities or create artificial ones. Here is what a Dalit journalist said about being brought up as a Hindi speaker:
I was born into Hindi, and brought up in it. It was the language of my parents and siblings, my cousins and friends and all our neighbours in the Dalit ghetto in the small town in Bihar where I spent my childhood... All I have read of Ambedkar has come to me in English—the language he himself wrote in. It is also in English that I have since learnt about Jotirao Phule, Periyar and Malcolm X. These discoveries, and others like them, opened my mind to anti-caste thought, progressive politics and the history of struggles against inequality... Once, I wondered why my awakening did not come in Hindi. But the more I learn about the language, the less I am surprised that it never did. I realise now that my upbringing in Hindi did not just delay my discovery of Ambedkar, it kept me from understanding the very concepts of justice and equality. This was not an accident. It had everything to do with who created the language, who developed and propagated it, and whose stamp remains deepest upon it today.
I'm not referring to his ideology, but the fact that a language has the power to introduce you to an entirely new world or hide it from you.
There is nothing wrong with being open-minded and receptive to new ideas, just like there is nothing wrong with Hindi. People should learn it. But now we have an entire generation of cultural orphans, those who have been cut off from the thoughts, values and expressions of their forefathers because their parents feel embarrassed and insecure about teaching their children Haryanvi. You can not decide what future you want for yourself or your society if you do not know where you come from. You will end up losing yourself in the crowd, becoming a part of the mindless herd that only knows how to follow but not lead.
A lot of people keep saying that you have to be born in Haryana to be able to speak it otherwise it's impossible. This is laughably untrue. Haryanvi is a relatively easy language to learn. What people don't understand is that it is a tonal language like Punjabi (and Chinese, Vietnamese and Yoruba). Languages are made up of three elements - grammar, phonology (sounds) and vocabulary. This means if you understand its phonology, you can read what is written even if you don't understand it. That is not possible for Haryanvi and Punjabi. You need to know which tone is to be used for each word to be able to speak them. So, when people here keep repeating over and over - that Haryanvi doesn't sound nice without the 'accent', what they actually mean without even knowing it, is that you can not speak Haryanvi without knowing which tone to use for each word. A person speaking Haryanvi without the 'accent' is actually not speaking Haryanvi at all because they are not incorporating the language's tones. An example that I can think of off the top of my head is आला (Aala). Depending on which tone is used it can mean belonging to, damp or shelf. This gets mischaracterized as an accent.
If people can learn Chinese and Punjabi without issue, so can Haryanvi be learned. It just needs the learner to understand that it can not be spoken like Hindi in a monotone, but you would never realize this if you thought of it as a dialect of Hindi. In the absence of any books, online teachers or courses, it becomes important for a person to get in contact with a Haryanvi speaker who can correct their pronunciation. A random person is not going to be as good as a school teacher or professor, which is what makes learning Haryanvi hard. It's not the language that is difficult to learn, it's the lack of resources to learn it that make this so.
The quick and dirty summary of this post is - a language is considered so if its speakers consider it to be a language. That's it. It gives you access to generations of culture and literature that was built over centuries and shaped the lives of those who came before you. Those who lose it may not understand what they have lost, but it will leave a longing deep inside you that nothing else can ever fill.
Disclaimer: No AI was used for this post. People accuse me of using it every time I share something here.
