Ahmed Indigenization of English Language in Ahmed Ali’s Twilight in Delhi

Abstract

The study employed the theoretical approach of indigenization by Kachru in Ahmed Ali’s Twilight in Delhi. Indigenization is one of the fundamental components of decolonization adopted by post-colonial linguists to familiarize a local language in a race against the dominant language of colonizers (Kilickaya, 2009). Through this tool of indigenization, post-colonial writers and more specifically, Ahmed Ali represented the native culture, flora, and fauna of the sub-continent in the selected work to bring about a reconciliatory approach between the languages of the colonizer (English) with the language of inhabitants of the sub-content (Urdu). Therefore, the novelist indigenized the English language by weaving and embedding indigenous figures of speech, local terminologies, idioms, proverbs, and translation of compacted concepts of English and Urdu languages into each other in an endeavor to combat with the western thought. Hence, the article delves into the novel to unfold the multicultural reconciliatory approach that is possible only at the time when the voices of the indigenous language and culture are accommodated by the dominant language and culture of the colonizers. Arguably, the portrayal of reconciliation of the two languages and cultures in the sub-continent during the rule of the British in the novel may introduce a more pluralistic approach to survive in the modern world of globalization. The findings may help reach a better understanding between an indigenous language and an international language in the same culture in which local culture and language get equal manifestation.