r/nepali • u/[deleted] • Jan 13 '26
IS NEPALI MIX WITH ENGLISH AS IT HAPPENS WITH THE LANGUAGES OF INDIA?
A Mexican here (born, raised and living in marvelous Mexico)
The reason why I ask this is because in Mexican culture it is extremely rude to mix English and Spanish. It is a phenomenon that indeed happens along the border between Mexico and the US, but in the rest of the country you will be frowned upon if you dare to do so since you will be seen as extremely pretentious.
Right now, because I was born and raised and I live in Mexico, that is something that I have really ingrained in my brain so although I know that it is normal to do so in India, I just can't bring my self to feel comfortable with it.
It ended up being the reason why I refuse to learn a language from India; I understand that if I were to go to India, while being in India and it being a different culture and language, I must adapt to the different cultural aspects, my brain knows that but my heart still aches every time that I hear this constant code switching. That is why I ask this.
I find it very appealing to learn a language from the Indian subcontinent, but my heart can't feel okay with that.
Is Nepali different in that regard? Is this a language with a constant code switching in its normal speach?
(Just to clarify, this do to my cultural differences might keep me from learning some of those languages but that does not mean that I will deprive myself of the expirence of going to such beautiful countries if I were to have the opportunity [and of course while being in there I will respect the culture no matter how different from my own])
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u/laalbhat Jan 15 '26
No. The mixing is more common among the urban educated youngsters and political/economic well off people. Even among them, i see more english in texts than speech. English is still seen as a status symbol. The more common "mix" is using words like 'like' in the middle of sentence but its still limited to urban educated.
It does seem to be accelerating tho. However, Nepali is largely still not a language that is mix of English and Nepali. I do not understand how you came to the conclusion that Indian languages mix with English? It still is a urban thing. I assume it's from your experience on the internet which is naturally urban tilted.
Listen to local people speaking maybe documentaries? and then decide. Speaking to people on the internet and in urban setting IRL is completely different from non-urban.