The language referred to as Saṃskṛta, "the cultured language" has long been venerated as a sacred, philosophical and classical literary language. A lingua franca in Greater India, today it is listed as one of the 22 scheduled languages of the country.

The 2001 Indian census reported that 14,000 people identified Sanskrit as their mother tongue and in 2010 Uttarakhand was the first state in India to declare Sanskrit as an official language.

Long looked upon as a classical language, in recent years a movement to revive Sanskrit and introduce it to a new generation of learners has emerged. Podcasts, blogs and websites are attempting to take a language that traces its origins to approximately 1500 - 2000 BC and make it relevant to a generation that is plugged in to Google and YouTube. StoryWeaver is proud to play a small role in the efforts of one organisation working in this realm.

StoryWeaver’s Sanskrit Journey

When StoryWeaver launched in September 2015, the digital open source repository of children’s stories had 24 languages. Within weeks of the launch, requests for new language additions began trickling in. One of them was for Sanskrit.

The request came from volunteers at Samskrita Bharati, a not-for-profit organisation, with its headquarters in New Delhi, and branches in Bangalore, India and San Jose, California. The organisation has been working to revive Sanskrit, in a number of ways. Their  10-day spoken Sanskrit classes are extremely popular and routinely organized all over India and in many major countries worldwide. Students learn conversational Sanskrit in a two hour class every day over a ten-day period and develop the ability to start having Sanskrit conversations.

Vikram Gakhar and Sreenivasan Chakrapani, both volunteer their time and efforts at Samskrita Bharati. It was at Vikram’s behest that Sanskrit was added to StoryWeaver, and in the 10 months since StoryWeaver’s inception, a growing community of Sanskrit enthusiasts have helped created a repository of children’s stories in the language on the site.

Mr Chakrapani is a former electrochemical engineer with a flair for languages. Fluent in English, Tamil, Hindi, Kannada, Italian and German, he chose to pursue the study of Sanskrit post retirement.

“An  inner urge took me to Sanskrit soon after retirement. I studied full time and set a target to myself: to be able to write in Sanskrit in two years and teach in the third year. I then volunteered to work for Samskrita Bharathi. They trained me, despite my advanced age, to conduct spoken Sanskrit camps. Since then I am doing my part on a small scale.” shared Mr. Chakrapani.

Mr. Chakrapani has conducted 10 spoken Sanskrit camps so far, and was introduced to StoryWeaver by his colleague at Samskrita Bharathi: Vikram Gakhar.  

Vikram is a full time engineer and a part time Sanskrit student/teacher/translator. “I teach Sanskrit to a group of 10 students at my workplace and try to create new material in Sanskrit whenever I get time. I came to know about StoryWeaver from the Pratham Books team at a storytelling session I attended in 2015.”

Both Mr. Chakrapani and Vikram use StoryWeaver to translate stories to Sanskrit with the intent of sharing them with students to help them improve their spoken Sanskrit skills.

“Translating stories on StoryWeaver serves a number of purpose. Creating simple reading material is useful to new students of Sanskrit. It's a fun and effective learning tool for my students which helps them exercise their knowledge of grammar to form sentences.  Also, since the stories are available in multiple languages on the platform, one can read and understand the Sanskrit version first and then read the same story in a more familiar language to find out what they didn't get the first time.” shared Vikram.

74 year old Mr. Chakrapani  admitted to not being very tech savvy, but found himself using StoryWeaver to translate with ease, thanks to its simple and intuitive user interface.

“We have a large student group and we circulate the translated story link via emails. Even the elders on the group have responded well, with grown ups wanting to read these children’s stories!” enthused Mr. Chakrapani.

Sujatha, another active translator, traces the origins of her translation work on StoryWeaver back to Samskrita Bharati too. An alumnus of the 10 day speaking course, she started reading children’s stories to improve her language skills before progressing to novels in Sanskrit.

“Translating stories for kids is a good way to start one’s learning journey as the language is simpler and helps one gain confidence. StoryWeaver has been a wonderful place for me to practice and hone my skills. ”

Sujatha shares how a dedicated group of Sanskrit enthusiasts get together every evening to converse in Sanskrit and share resources.

“Our group logs on to a Google Hangout every night at 9pm. Whoever is free can join in. We speak to each other in Sanskrit about everything from current affairs to what we are reading. We also use a Google group to document and share the translations we create, including the ones on Storyweaver. This way, it’s easily accessible to everyone.”

 

 

 

StoryWeaver is proud to have collaborators like Mr. Chakrapani, Vikram, Sujatha and their fellow language lovers Suneesh Namboodiri, Govindraj Kasul, Sini Mukundan and Anand Viswanathan. We look forward to seeing more translations by them on the site, and hope that we can be instrumental in sharing them with more people across the world.

Further reading and listening

Sudharma, is the only Sanskrit newspaper in publication today. Printed in Mysore, Karnataka, you can read an online version here.

Balamodini is a podcast of Sanskrit stories read by Samskrita Bharati volunteers from the Sambhashana Sandesha Sanskrit Magazine.

 

comments (2)

---

 

"যিদিনাই প্ৰত্যেক শিশুৰ হাতত এখন সহজে বুজি পোৱা অসমীয়া কিতাপ থাকিব মোৰ অনুবাদ সফল হ'ব"

 

"My translations will be a success when an Assamese  book with illustrations is in every child's hand."

When we told you in a previous blog post, that Rantu Moni Deka, is a man on a mission, we weren't joking. He's translated 15 stories to Assamese on StoryWeaver, and written the first, orginal Assamese community story too!

Rantu sent us a lovely message on International Translation Day which we wanted to share with our readers.

"First of all Thanks to Pratham Books StoryWeaver for giving us a platform for doing something for the lovely kids. Learning depends on the ability to read. When children have access to enjoyable, enriching stories in their own languages, the transformation in their reading skills are visible. The sheer joy of reading stories that are engaging and capture their imagination can make children become readers. Which in turn, makes them better learners. 

Assam Govt. students have access to libraries in school, but the books are not proper for them and so the children ofcourse are not interested in them. But they love StoryWeaver stories which have been translated to Assamese. The children feel so happy with the colourful illustration and a story that is easily understood by them. If these storybooks are available in their school library and also in the village library where the children meet together in the evening then my dreams will come true.

I will encourage others to use StoryWeaver and will try my best to translate more stories to Assamese so that children can read all the Pratham Books stories in their hands."

Be the first to comment.

---

Madhu B. Joshi prefers to be known as a communication practitioner. She sees a great need for demystification in daily life and has been trying to work towards it. She has taught translation and a short, self-designed course of Indian Culture; mentored content teams of major education NGOs and designed educational audio-video programmes for CIET, NCERT. Joshi is a translator of Hindi poetry and short fiction in English and has presented major black feminist writers in Hindi. She is also a prolific and visionary collaborator of StoryWeaver. All of this, and we also know and love the other मधु बी. जोशी (in her own words)... जो खाना पकाना, इलाज करना, पौधे और कुत्ते पालना, राय देना.. जैसे बहुत से मुफ़्त काम करती हैं। उन्हें सब से ज़्यादा मज़ा बच्चों के लिए काम करने में आता है और वह इसका कोई मौका नहीं चूकतीं। 

Here, we re-present an article of hers that was carried in Hindustan on International Translation Day (30th Sept). In this article, she gives us historical evidence to emphasize the power of translations. She talks about how translations of key religious texts helped break religious barriers and induce world peace in the strife ridden political milieu of the 16th Century.

अनुवाद के धर्म के चेहरे को बदलने और उसे अधिक लोकोन्मुख और सर्वसुलभ बनाने के दो बड़े उदाहरण हैं रामायण और बाइबल के 16वीं सदी में आए संस्करण। इन ग्रंथों ने अपनी भाषा और युग को नए शब्द, नए मुहावरे और नई अवधारणाएं ही नहीं दीं, सामाजिक और राजनीतिक बदलाव की प्रक्रिया को भी प्रभावित किया। कम से कम यूरोप में तो इन के बाद लेखन का तेवर पूरी तरह बदल गया। आज अगर धर्म पर सार्वजनिक बहस संभव है तो उसकी पीठिका इन्हीं अनुवादों ने तैयार की है।

बाइबल के शुरूआती जर्मन और अंग्रेज़ी अनुवाद करने वाले मार्टिन लूथर और विलियम टिंडेल हिब्रू-ग्रीक और लैटिन जैसी शास्त्रीय भाषाओं के अधिकारी विद्वान और धर्मशास्त्री थे (बाइबल के उनके अनुवाद इस ग्रंथ के हिब्रू-ग्रीक पाठों पर आधारित थे) तो रामायण का पुर्नपाठ करने वाले तुलसीदास संस्कृत के अधिकारी विद्वान और धर्मशास्त्री थे। लेकिन अपने युग और समाज के लिए, अभी तक अभिजातवर्ग तक सीमित रहे और ज्ञान के समानार्थक बन चुकेशास्त्रीय ग्रंथों को लोक के लिए सुलभ बनाने के लिए उन्होंने घर-गली-बाज़ार की भाषा को आधार बनाया। तुलसीदास ने काव्यरचना की तत्कालीन भाषा ब्रजभाषा के बजाय अपने क्षेत्र की लोकभाषा अवधी में रामचरितमानस लिखा। 

यह अनुवाद धर्मविरूद्ध माने गए। आखिर वह धर्मग्रंथों के एक वर्गविषेश द्वारा ही लिखे-पढ़े और व्याख्या किए जाने की परंपरा से ज़बर्दस्त विचलन थे। यूरोप में तो यह चर्च और उस के समर्थन से चल रही राजा की सत्ता को बड़ी चुनौती थे। मार्टिन लूथर का साथ उनके अनुयायियों ने तक छोड़ दिया, विलियम टिंडेल के अनुवाद की प्रतियां राजादेष पर जलाई गईं, खुद उन की हत्या की गई, तुलसीदास और रामचरितमानस काषी के विद्वतवर्ग का कोपभाजन बने रहे।

इन तीनों अनुवादों ने अभिजातवर्ग का विषेशाधिकार बन चुके शास्त्रीय ज्ञान को जनसाधारण के लिए सुलभ बना कर विषेशाधिकार और ज्ञान पर एकाधिकार को एक झटके में तोड़ दिया। दरअसल इस आंदोलन की शुरूआत पहले ही जर्मन बोलियों में लैटिन स्त्रोतों के अनुवाद और भारतीय बोलियों में भक्ति और ज्ञान के पदों की रचना से हो चुकी थी। इनमें से बहुत सी रचनाओं में विचार के स्तर पर शास्त्रीय धर्मग्रंथों की अनुगूंज सुनाई देती है लेकिन सच यह भी है कि इनके रचनाकार, कम से कम भारत में, ज़्यादातर परंपरागत शास्त्रीय ज्ञान से दूर रखे गए वर्गों से थे। यह सभी रचनाएं पुरोहित वर्ग के दान-दक्षिणा-प्रायश्चित-अनुष्ठान को मुक्ति का साधन बताने के विरूद्ध स्वर उठाते हुए मनुष्य के व्यक्तिगत कर्म को, मनुष्य के देवताओं को समर्पण के बरक्स मनुष्य के जीवमात्र के प्रति करूणाभाव को सर्वोच्च मान रही थीं जिससे पुरोहित की ज़रूरत और वैधता ही संदेह के दायरे में आ गई। जीवमात्र के प्रति करूणाभाव कोई नई अवधारणा नहीं थी। ईसाई संत फ्रांसिस और बुद्ध ने करूणा का उपदेश बहुत पहले दिया ही था लेकिन पुरोहितवर्ग ने उसे ईश्वर और ईसा का विषेश लक्षण बना दिया था। 

यूरोप में बाइबल के अनुवादों को यूरोप की राजसत्ताओं पर रोमन कैथॅलिक चर्च की कड़ी जकड़ को तोड़ने वाली घटना माना जाता है जिसने आखिर अरब, ईसाई और मुसलमान सेनाओं के बीच चलनेवाले धर्मयुद्धों को लगभग खत्म कर दिया। रामचरितमानस और भक्ति काव्य ने हिंदू धर्म के आधार, चतुर्वर्ण की अवधारणा पर पुनर्विचार किए जाने की ज़रूरत को रेखांकित किया और यह क्रम अब भी जारी है।
 

Read Madhu B Joshi's happy translations on StoryWeaver here. One World, that's the eternal dream! 

Be the first to comment.

---