Thread by @shrikanth_krish

With the publication of a "genetic" study on Rakhigarhi DNA, yet again we see attempts to politicize very tentative hypotheses on pre-historic migrations drawn from such studies.

(Contd..)

It is stated that "Dravidians" are the original inhabitants of the subcontinent - a ridiculous comment given that the word "Dravidian" connotes a lingual family, and has no racial association.

In traditional Indian literature the Sanskrit term "Dravida" did not even denote a language group, but merely a geographical region

This is not to deny the existence of two very distinct language families, nor deny the possibility of significant migrations from outside the subcontinent some 3500-4500 YBP

Nor the migrations within the subcontinent from North to South for which we have historical records

The problem occurs when people get very "touchy" (on both the Left and the Right) about these often pre-historic migrations and politicize it in our times.

Just about every country has had its genetic make-up significantly altered in the course of their respective histories.

India by no means is an exception.

It is simply not a big deal

Let's take England. A country that often prides itself on being a very distinctive "nation state" for nearly a thousand years, since the Norman conquest.

But most Englishmen today (atleast in Southern England) have a large component of their ancestry that is not native to British Isles even if one goes back by barely 1600-1700 years

English itself is not a language native to Britain. It developed out of the Old English Germanic dialects spoken in Northern Europe - the language introduced to British Isles by the Germanic invasions of the Angles, Saxons and the Jutes circa 450-500 AD

It is a historical fact that the original inhabitants of British Isles (even as recently as 2000 years ago) were for the most part Celts, who spoke dialects completely unrelated to the modern English tongue.

England has had many invasions since ,that have changed its genetic as well as lingual identity.

These are not ancient migrations mind you, but migrations in the past 2000 years.

The Roman invasion circa 0-100AD

Saxon invasions (that introduced the English language and Anglo Saxon culture) circa 450-500AD

Scandinavian / VIking invasions between 700-1000AD

Norman invasion in 11th century

Yet no one in the UK today breaks their head over whether their ancestry is Saxon or Celtic.

Sure there is still a Celtic vs Saxon divide when you think of Ireland vs England.

But in England itself, no one really is insecure about how "Saxon" their ancestry really is

It is perhaps only in India that atleast I get to see such heated debates over the implications of pre-historic migrations on modern populations

It is a peculiarly Indian pre-occupation.

And these are not even relatively recent migrations like the Saxon or Norman invasions mind you.

We are talking about "possible" migrations that atleast date back some 1500-2000 years before the Common era.

Yet it causes people to bang their heads on dinner tables in 2018 AD

Indology is partly to blame for this, for having created spurious North vs South divides using formal language theory to posit this notion of two distinct language families back in the 19th century.

While the idea of two language families may be technically correct in a narrow sense, it is also dangerous because people are apt to equate lingual distinctions with racial distinctions. Always a dangerous conflation.

What language theorists also underplay is the enormous influence of Sanskrit on ALL languages including the Dravidian languages.

Tamil for instance has its grammar influenced greatly by the Aindra school (a Pre-Paninian school of grammar from North India)

But not all the blame can be laid at the door of Indology. The Indian conservative reaction to these 19th century theories has also been very reactionary and puerile

What was particularly silly is the enormous intellectual and emotional investment made by some sections of the RIght in India in equating Vedic civilization with the Indus valley civilization (newly discovered in early 20th cen).

An effort that perhaps was not warranted

While I dont rule out IVC having elements of Vedic culture, the Right made a tactical mistake by blowing this academic matter out of all proportion and making it central to their ideology

A more agnostic/indifferent attitude towards the dates would have served their case better

What the "nationalist" project needs to emphasize is that a distinction of "Aryan" vs "Dravidian" culture has never existed at any point in Indian history.

I grew up in Southern India, and am familiar with Tamil and Kannada. I can vouch that many Tatsama Sanskrit words are more likely to be used in these languages than in heartland UP

Take a word like "Idam" meaning "this" in Sanskrit.

Even today, in both Tamil and Kannada, the word for "this" is idhu.

A sharp contrast to North India where expressions like "Yah" / "Ye" are used (whose provenance I am not sure of) (others can chip in here)

There are other words like "Prayojana" "Vipareeta" - that are a lot more common in Davanagere Karnataka than in Ballia UP.

Even in Tamil Nadu, Sanskrit words like Prayojanam, Adhikam are extremely common in use among both brahmins and non brahmins.

More so than in many parts of North India where words like Matlab and Zyada are used as opposed to Prayojana, Adhik.

Many aspects of ancient HIndu culture (be it Shrauta ritual or even Agamic ritual) are better preserved in Southern India than in the North.

So much for the Aryan - Dravidian cultural divide.

The major problem with public discourse is the obsession with academic studies (be it lingual or genetic), which are usually misleading.

What's unfashionable these days is to close the books / PDFs, and actually talk to people on the ground. And study their culture.

Talking to people gives you an impression of a much more closely united and culturally homogeneous India - an India with very few of the racial and lingual schisms that get talked up in academia.

I hope this thread causes at least a few people to turn less pedantic, and induces them to study culture in a more old fashioned way, by engaging with it (warts and all).

Books seldom teach you culture. Practice does.