Anglo-Indian respondents were all coordinate bilinguals in
English and Malayalam. (29)
There was no evidence to indicate that all the Anglo-Indian
respondents could read and write two Indian languages.
Table 1 lists the various languages spoken by Anglo-Indians
in the twelve cities. The Anglo-Indians agreed, that
speaking a language was inadequate. The students realised
that they also had to learn to write and read an Indian
language. On many occasions, the Anglo-Indians admitted
that their knowledge of the spoken Indian language was
grammatically incorrect.
They rarely used the Indian language in a social situation,
that is, with non Anglo-Indians. The reason was simple.
Non Anglo-Indians preferred speaking in English to Anglo-
Indians. The Indian language was rarely used in the home.
It was used as a basic means of communication outside the
home. One respondent described the spoken language as
"bazaar (market) talk". Anglo-Indians felt inadequate in
expressing themselves fluently in an Indian language.
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