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The Dialect Geography of Rajasthan Survey

Tribes of Rajasthan constitute almost 14% of the total population of the state. The main tribal communities of Rajasthan are Bhil and Meena tribe. The major concentration of both of the tribes of Rajasthan is found mainly in the slope of Vindhya, Aravalli mountain ranges. The tribes of Rajasthan are very different from each other and represent a very distinct heritage from the rest of the civilized population. In order to maintain their livelihood, these tribes carry on cultivation, while there are quite a number of tribes of state who have developed acumen for business and commercial activities and as well as service classes. The early history of the tribes of Rajasthan depicts that during the invasions by Hunas, Aryans, Sakas and Kushana; the tribal communities survived the attacks and maintained their cultural and traditional heritage till today. Among the scheduled tribes of Rajasthan, Meena tribe occupies the major position. Another scheduled tribe of this state which has got importance is Bhil Tribe with its variants. At the core of the state of Rajasthan, the Meena (Mina) tribes live with its treasure of cultural tradition as depicted in its superb language, food habits, gorgeous clothes and other specific particularities.

Indigenous people of Rajasthan

Rajasthan tribals constitute around twelve percent of the total population of the state. The tribes of Rajasthan, India constitutes of mainly Bhils and the Minas. Infact, they were the original inhabitants of the area where Rajasthan stands now. Apart from these main tribes, there are also a number of smaller tribes in Rajasthan. However all Rajasthan tribes share certain common traits, the variations being in their costumes, jewelry, fair and festivals, etc. 1)   Bhils: Bhils are the biggest tribe in Rajasthan. Banswara is the main area where Bhils in large numbers. Previously Bhils main occupation was to collect the food. Famous epics of Ramayana and Mahabharata depicted that Bhils were famous for their skills in arching. From collecting food, they started farming for their livelihood. Baneshwar fair in January and February is the best place to know more about Bhil tribe. The second largest tribal group of Rajasthan is that of the Bhils after Minas. Dominating in the Banswara area of Rajasthan, the Bhils are believed to be fine archers. Infact, Bhil bowmen even found a reference in the great epics Mahabarata and Ramayan. The Bhils were originally food gatherers. However, with the passage of time, they have taken up small-scale agriculture, city residence and employment. The major festivals of Bhils are the Baneshwar fair (held near Dungarpur) and Holi.

2)  Mina / Meena : Mina’s tribesmen and women generally possess a good physic with an athletic body built, big eyes and sharp features. They are known to be the inhabitants of Indus Valley Civilization. There broad lips and a whitish complexion. Eastern part of the state in Easter part belt of Rajasthan is the main area where Minas are in populous condition. Around 39% of Rajasthan tribals comprises of the Bhils.. The original inhabitants of the Indus Valley civilization, Minas have a tall, athletic build with sharp features, large eyes, thick lips and a light brown complexion. They are found dominating the regions of Shekhawati and eastern Rajasthan. Minas solemnize marriage in the younger years of the children.

3)  Garasias : Garasias are another small Rajput Rajasthan tribe residing in Mount Abu Road area of Udaipur District in Damors of Dungarpur in southern Rajasthan. Damors is also a subtribe of Garasias and belonging to the Dungarpur and Udaipur districts, Damors are mainly cultivators and manual laborers.

4)  Sahariyas: Sahariyas is one of the most backward Meena tribe. Sahariyas people inhabits mainly in Jungle. They are also noted to be Bhils. Southeastern Rajasthan in Dungarpur, Baran and Kota are some places where Sahariyas can be found. Sahariyas, the jungle dwellers, is considered as the most backward tribe in Rajasthan. Believed to be of Bhil origin, they inhabit the areas of Kota, Dungarpur and Sawai Madhopur in the southeast of Rajasthan. Their main occupations include working as shifting cultivators, hunters and fishermen.

5)  Rajasthan tribes include the following also: Mer and Banjara (the nomadic tribes), Kathodi (found in Mewar region), Rabaris (cattle breeders, found in Marwar region), Sansi, Kanjar

Historical aspect of Meena / Mina

They also claim to be descendants of the people of the Matsya Kingdom, which flourished in the 6th century B.C. Nandini Sinha Kapur, a historian who has studied early India, notes that the oral traditions of the Meenas were developed from the early 19th century AD in an attempt to reconstruct their identity. She says of this process, which continued throughout the 20th century, that "The Minas try to furnish themselves a respectable present by giving themselves a glorious past". In common with the people of countries such as Finland and Scotland, the Meenas found it necessary to invent tradition through oral accounts, one of the primary uses of which is recognised by both historians and sociologists as being "social protest against injustices, exploitation and oppression, a raison d'être that helps to retrieve the image of a community." Kapur notes that the Meenas not merely lack a recorded history of their own but also have been depicted in a negative manner both by medieval Persian accounts and records of the colonial period. From medieval times through to the British Raj, references to the Meenas describe them as violent, plundering criminals and an anti-social ethnic tribal group. One such measure was the Criminal Tribes Act of 1871, under the provisions of which the Meenas were placed. Because they were struggled for their existence and pride. Mark Brown has examined the impact and issues of the Meena community during British rule and the change in their status from being a higher social group to a criminal tribe. The community remained stigmatised for many years, notably by influential officials of the Raj such as Herbert Hope Risley and Denzil Ibbetson, and were sometimes categorised as animists and as a hill tribe similar to the Bhils. The Raj colonial administration came into existence in 1858, following the Indian Rebellion of 1857 which caused the government of Britain to decide that leaving colonial administration in the hands of the East India Company was a recipe for further discontent. In an attempt to create an orderly administration through a better understanding of the populace, the Raj authorities instituted various measures of classifying the people of India. The Meenas remained an officially designated criminal tribe until 1952, three years after the Act had been repealed. Meenas have better rights for women in many respects compared to many other Hindu castes. The Scheduled Tribes professing Hinduism form 99.5 per cent, whereas those professing Islam and Christianity constitute a meagre 0.1 per cent and 0.3 per cent respectively. Tribal following Sikhism, Budhism, Jainism, Other religion and persuations together constitute a very small (7,174) population.

Linguistic Aspect

§ The Dialect Geography of Rajasthan Survey has completed by Professor Ram Lakhan Meena in a major research project of University Grants Commission, New Delhi.The Mina (Meena) language is one of the tribal language / dialect of Rajasthan which is spoken in Eastern part of Rajasthan states of India by Indigenous community Meena. They are considered to be adivasi (aboriginal people) which are scheduled in the tribes of India also. They are habitat in various parts of Rajasthan as well as the country, but they are mainly found in the districts of Sawai Madhopur, Karauli, Kota, Bundi, Jhalawad, Udaipur, Alwar, Dausa, Jaipur, Tonk and some part of Bharatpur and Dholpur; there is also a small population living in Sikar, Jalore and Ajmer districts. See details in Appendix A, for a map of the Mina (Meena) Language survey region. The Mina (Meena) language area is situated between 24° 12’-76°88, 25°14-76°36’, 26°03’-76°82 and 27°01’-76°20, latitude-longitude. In the past, the region was arid and barren, but today it is well watered and fertile due to modern technic of irrigation and agricultural instrumentation. It is likely that a significant number of Mina (Meena) speakers were subsumed under this category. Therefore, the population of Mina (Meena) speakers in Rajasthan is probably much higher. The Mina (Meena) language (ISO 639–3: myi) is classified as Indo–European, Indo–Iranian, Indo–Aryan, Central zone, Mina, Unclassified (Ethnologue 2013) but unfortunately it was deleted from list of world languages. The Devanagri script is used for writing meena/mina language.

The term ‘Mina (Meena)’ refers to both the people and their language. The Mina (Meena) are generally members of Scheduled Tribe as per scheduled list of Indian constitution and they are also belongs to the oldest indigenous people of the Indus Civilisation. The researchers observed the people to be friendly, hospitable, and open to outsiders. According to the 1991 census also listed 13,098,078 people as ‘Meena’ speakers. As per the ‘Dialect Geography of Rajasthan survey, Mina (Meena) speakers were found to be living mostly as rural communities. The Mina (Meena) people are divided into a number of exogamous clans. They practice monogamy when a young woman gets married, she is also supposed to wear a veil as a sign of humility before her husband. Unlike in many other groups, widow remarriage is allowed. Any of the brothers of a deceased man can inherit his wife, or widows can do ritual remarry out of the family.

If a widow refuses to marry her brother–in–law, she must pay compensation to him or his family. The main occupations of the Mina (Meena) people are animal husbandry, cultivation, and cottage industries. In addition, they frequently work for daily wages. Some are employed in government–related services. The findings of dialect geography of Rajasthan a critical survey done by this author states that ‘Mina (Meena) is used as a lingua franca of [the] majority of the population in eastern Rajasthan, and east southern Rajasthan. Due to its strategic geographical location, Mina (Meena) has been in stable contact with other dialects of rajasthani language. These dialects spoken adjacent to Mina (Meena) might have caused language change in Mina (Meena) at various levels.’

Phonology : Vowels of Mina / Meena Language

A vowel is a syllabic speech sound pronounced without any stricture in the vocal tract. Vowels are one of the two principal classes of speech sounds, the other being the consonant. Vowels vary in quality, in loudness and also in quantity (length). They are usually voiced, and are closely involved in prosodic variation such as tone, intonation and stress. Meena language has 50 sounds, including 35 consonants, 13 vowels and 2 semi vowels. The language has developed three lexical tones: low, mid and high. a speech sound which is produced by comparatively open configuration of the vocal tract, with vibration of the vocal cords but without audible friction, and which is a unit of the sound system of a language that forms the nucleus of a syllable as letter representing a vowel sound, such as a, e, i, o, u.

Phonology : Consonants of Mina / Meena Language

Since the number of possible sounds in all of the world's languages is much greater than the number of letters in any one alphabet (linguists have devised systems such as the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) to assign a unique and unambiguous symbol to each attested consonant- In fact) the Meena Language (myi) alphabet has fewer consonants.

Sound level

1)	The pronunciation of vowels in the Mina dialect is chaotic for example (a:) is pronounced (a) and (e) and (a) is pronounced as (ә).

2) Most of the vowels, "the process of acceptance is shown most of the places."

3) At the same time, the pronunciation of 'sa' is 'H' in the pronunciation of the recipes, in some places the pronunciation of 'g' (b) is generally 's' (े), and

4) In the pronunciation of the recipes, the pronunciation of 's' (é) is 'h' (iv) A. In some places, the pronunciation of 'six' (b) is generally 's' (े) and

5) In most of the survey sites, the pronunciation of 'Dental' (s) is found in place of the palatable 'sh' (s) 'A' the word 'sh'. 'A' has been written (A) A (A), but it becomes 'B' (E) everywhere.

6) This trend is targeted in Rajasthan. It has been found in the survey that the word "sound" in the speech is closely related to the sound (A) before self or long A, U, O, A and O, and "before (A) The tax seems closer. As long as (a) and (A) dishes are pure orthocentrical or intimate sounds, its pronunciation is affected by the subsequent tone.

7) The sound arises by pressing the upper teeth on the lower lip, it is a denture sound. And (v) is considered a pure voice, which is not caused by pressing the lips, but instead of breathing out between the two lips.

8) In addition, there is a multiplicity of silent sounds. 'L' (S) and 'L' (T) are quite popular here. During the survey, most of the compiled material was found to be the Marwari representation format of 'L' ('S') and 'No' (D), but the soundtrack is not found in the sermon (Chapepajpavadpad), in such a situation, Are very similar to.

9) In 'B' (a) 'A' (in) of 'A' (k) in the words 'd' (k) and 'r' (x3), the plurality and prominence of 'd' is found.

Morphology

Meena has two numbers and two genders with three cases. Postpositions are of two categories, inflexional and derivational. Derivational postpositions are mostly omitted in actual discourse. Syntax

•        Meena Language belongs to the languages that mix three types of case marking systems: nominative – accusative: transitive (A) and intransitive (S) subjects have similar case marking, different from that of transitive object (O); absolutive-ergative (S and O have similar marking, different from A), tripartite (A, S and O have different case marking). There is a general tendency existing in the languages with split nominal systems: the split is usually conditioned by the referents of the core NPs, the probability of ergative markingincreasing from left to right in the following nominal hierarchy: first person pronouns – second person pronouns – demonstratives and third person pronouns – proper nouns – common nouns (human – animate – inanimate). Meena split case marking system partially follows this hierarchy:first and second person pronouns have similar A and S marking, the other pronouns and singular nouns are showing attrition of A/S opposition.

•        Agreement: 1. Meena Lamguage combines accusative/tripartite marking in nominal system with consistently ergative verbal concord: the verb agrees with both marked and unmarked O in number and gender (but not in person — contrast Braj). Another peculiar feature of Meena is the split in verbal concord when the participial component of a predicate agrees with O-NP while the auxiliary verb might agree with A-NP. 2. Stative participle from transitive verbs may agree with the Agent. 3. Honorific agreement of feminine noun implies masculine plural form both in its modifiers and in the verb.

•        In Hindi and Punjabi only a few combinations of transitive verbs with their direct objects may form past participles modifying the Agent: one can say in Hindi:‘Hindii siikhaa aadmii’ – ‘a man who has learned Hindi’ or ‘saaRii baãdhii auraat’ – ‘a woman in sari’, but *‘kitaab paRhaa aadmii ‘a man who has read a book’ is impossible. Semantic features of verbs whose perfective participles may be used as modifiers are described in (Dashchenko 1987). Meena seems to have less constrains on this usage, compare bad in Hindi but normal in Meena.

•        Meena Language has retained an important feature of ergative syntax lost by the other representatives of Modern Western New Indo-Aryan (NIA), namely, the free omission of Agent NP from the perfective transitive clause.

•        Meena Language is the only Western NIA language where the reflexes of Old Indo-Aryan synthetic passive have penetrated into the perfective domain.

•        Meena Language has similarities to the other NIA languages shows deviations from Baker’s 'mirror principle', that requires the strict pairing of morphological and syntactic operations (Baker 1988). The general rule is that the 'second causative' formation implies a mediator in the argument structure. However, some factors block addition of an extra agent into the causative construction.

•        In the typical Indo-Aryan relative-correlative construction the modifying clause is usually marked by a member of the "J" set of relative pronouns, adverbs and other words, while the correlative in the main clause is identical with the remote demonstrative (except in Sindhi and in Dakhini). Gujarati and Marathi frequently delete the preposed "J" element. In Meena the relative pronoun or adverb may also be deleted from the subordinate clause but – as distinct from the neighbouring NIA – relative pronoun or adverb may be used instead of correlative.

•        Relative pronoun 'jakau' may be used not only in relative/correlative constructions, but also in complex sentences with "cause/effect" relations This is a descriptive study of the Meena / Mina Language spoken in the most of the parts of eastern Rajasthan. The study is based on data collected in a major project of University Grants Commission of India namely ‘Dialect-Geography of Rajasthan’ by the author of this research paper. The whole work consists of description of phonology, morphology, and syntax, with some discussion of its native speakers by surveying method, orientation system and variations within the language. There are also some regional features, such as the orientation system, that are present in all languages in the state of Rajasthan regardless the language families. It has more prominent typology, such as SVO word order and a simplified inflectional system.

In particular, this research is able to build a comprehensive theory of the expression side of language, mainly phonology, morphology. This descriptive study is conveniently divided into three parts phonology, morphology and grammar, which form the core of descriptive linguistic research. It has rightly been pointed out by one of the leading descriptive linguists, H.A. Gleason (1995). Using the phoneme and the morpheme as their basic units, linguists have been able to build a comprehensive theory of the expression side of the language, and to make detailed and comprehensive statements about the expression systems of specific languages. This is what is ordinarily called descriptive linguistics.

The thesis begins with the ethnographic description of Meena / Mina language. This chapter emphasizes that languages must be frequently investigated as immediate expression of the interaction between humans and their environment. The first Chapter provides the ethnographic information of the people, their land, living habitat, culture, population etc. The second chapter deals with the classification of the language. This chapter is divided into three parts: (1) Genetic Classification, (2) Typological Classification and (3) Morphological Classification. Genetic Classification deals with the genealogical classification of the Meena / Mina language. Meena / Mina belongs to Indo Aryan family of languages.

The different classifications proposed by linguists for Indo-Aryan languages are given. The language has been mentioned in some of the classifications and in some classifications the language is not mentioned. The possibility of the placement of the language in particular family is also discussed where the language has not been mentioned under any branch. The second section of this chapter discusses the typological classification of the language. The typological characteristics of the Meena / Mina language are carried out by comparing the features with other languages of the family. This classification is based on the model of Subbarao, 1997 (cf typological characteristics of Indo Aryan languages).

The common features of the Indo- Aryan languages are also discussed. Meena / Mina exhibits the SOV word order pattern, i.e. it is a verb final language as other Indo-Aryan languages. Meena / Mina has post-positions like other verb final languages. Genitive precedes the governing noun in Meena / Mina. The marker of comparison follows the standard of comparison in Meena / Mina like other IndoAryan languages. Time adverbials (TA) precede Place Adverbials (PA) in Indo-Aryan and also in Meena / Mina. Time Adverbials and Place Adverbials occur in descending order in Meena / Mina. Adjectives can follow or precede the head noun i.e. modified in Indo-Aryan languages and also in Meena / Mina. In Meena / Mina, numerals follow the head noun and it can also precede the head noun. Determiners follow the head noun in the unmarked word order. It may also precede the head noun.

Meena / Mina also has split determiners. The negative particles occur pre-verbally in some Indo- Aryan languages and this characteristic is also found in Meena / Mina. The question particles or wh- constituents occur pre-verbally in Meena / Mina. Meena / Mina has relative clause but relative pronoun is absent and the determiners sometime serve the purpose of relative pronouns. In Meena / Mina, adverbs can be re-duplicated as other South-Asian and Indo-Aryan languages. The third section of this chapter discusses the morphological classification of Meena / Mina language. Meena / Mina is partly isolating and partly agglutinating. In particular, it also deals with the morphological typology of Indo-Aryan languages.

The chapter discusses the different methodologies that were employed done on Indo-Aryan languages. Model Selected is divided into two parts; i.e. review of the literature and the selection of the model. The fifth chapter deals with the phonological analysis of the language. The discussions are made on vowels, phonemic and allophonic vowels, phonetic description of vowels and diphthongs, the consonants, allophonic consonant, phonetic description of consonants, consonant clusters, and geminates. The distinctive features for vowels and consonants are discussed in another section. The canonical structure of words and syllabic structure are also discussed.

This chapter also deals with tones and the types of tones. In particular, it also deals with morphophonemics, rules and phonological processes in Meena / Mina. The sixth chapter deals with the morphological analysis of the language. In this chapter, the morphological categories- the primary and the secondary grammatical categories- are dealt with, in detail. This chapter discusses the structure and use of the Nouns, Number, Case, Gender, Numeral, Pronouns, Adjective, Adverbs, Verbs, Tense, Aspect, Mood, Negation and Word Formation Processes. The study of nouns includes the structure of nouns, types of nouns, classification of nouns. The number has been discussed for its inflection for plurals. The different cases, and the gender, the numerals - cardinal and ordinal and also the patterns of numerals - are discussed. Pronoun and different types of pronouns, adjective, their patterns, classifications, inflections, degrees of adjectives, structures are discussed.

The discussion on adverbs includes their classification and structure. The study on verbs includes the infinitive pattern of verbs, classification of the verbs and other types of verbs. Tense, aspect and mood have also been discussed. This chapter also includes the discussion on negation. ' This work is an attempt to describe the language. This descriptive study does not claim to be the complete analysis of Meena / Mina language. A detailed and proper analysis on Syntax and Semantics is also required. Serious efforts are needed on morphology and syntax. However, we can hope that this thesis will provide a base for future research. This can point some future steps which will be helpful in the further research on Meena / Mina.