International Mother Language Day

Language is the medium of communicating while most of the species on earth interact with each other in their developed vocal sounds. Human beings are also one of them but with a distinction that is the cognitive value of language. It differs human being from other creatures of the world. It helps to acquire knowledge and give mental power such as thinking, reasoning and remembering.

The human being would have developed this cognitive value during their evolution. That is a boon today, the whole world looks united as all sorts of peoples come together and sharing their thoughts, values, tradition, art, craft and knowledge with each other.

Mother Tongue / Language

Mother Tongue means a language that connects mother and child to each other naturally. This is the only language which connects the communication between the mother and the child. 

"The only language men ever speak perfectly is the one they learn in babyhood when no one can teach them anything! " -Maria Montessori

Mother language is a natural way of understanding the needs of a child just by his/her activity by his/her mother. There is no need for understanding a particular language, it happens naturally. It's a boon to all mothers on this earth by the GOD. So, from this instance, you can understand the power of Mother Tongue. 

"If you talk to a man in a language he understands, that goes to his head.  If you talk to him in his language, that goes to his heart"-Nelson Mandela

Why the mother tongue or mother language is important?

The answer to this question is "6E" which defines the mother tongue in a broadway. 

• Easy to Understand: It means easy to learn new things quickly.  In other words, catching things more easily which is difficult to imbibe otherwise. It happens naturally, you learn things quickly in your mother tongue.  There is a great incidence associated with it in our mythological book Mahabharata where Abhimanyu the son of Arjun had learned the tactics to break the Chakravihu so smartly in his mother's womb only and he had applied that skill on the battlefield too later on. So, this ease of understanding makes this language great.

• Enhance Creativity: The beauty of a language is a novelty to say the things in a different way. It opens up the mind to take new challenges and develop the language. Language consists of slangs and other language words and phrases, it helps us to present our thoughts and ideas in novel ways. We can interact with peoples in a novel way better in our mother tongue instead of any second language.

• Elate Confidence: Mother language boost up the confidence to express our feeling,  thoughts, ideas. We feel better in expressing our views in our first known language.

• Eternal love: As a first language, we have been connected with this language since birth. This resides in our heart and we are eternally connected to it. Assume you are in a country where no one knows your language and suddenly one day you meet someone who knows your language and belongs to the same place. That moment will give you immense pleasure which you can't express in words.

• Expressive: You can express your feelings, thought, ideas and sharing your knowledge so elaborately with others in comparison to any other second language. It is related to your confidence. We are more expressive in our first language only.

• Establish Identity: The Mother Tongue / Language gives us social, economic, cultural and linguistic identity. Our language gives us a unique identity.

As per the Cambridge Dictionary the definition of identity is: who a person is, or the qualities of a person or group that make them different from others:

"Language is the road map of a culture. It tells you where its people come from and where they are going."-Rita Mae Brown

Importance of  Learning Other  Language 

The level of development of the children’s mother tongue is a
 strong predictor of their second language development. -Thomas and Collin, 2001

The first language is really a great medium to express your feelings, ideas or thought but learning some other languages open up new ways to understand new things, ideas and culture that help us to prosper in life with creativity. You can share your knowledge, ideas and perceptions with each other to learn their language Culture, Ethics, Art and Craft. 

“Learning another language is not only learning different words for the same things but learning another way to think about things.” – Flora Lewis

International Mother Language Day 

It is celebrated on 21st February every year with a theme to promote linguistic and cultural diversity with multilingualism.

History of   Mother Language Day 

A group of peoples of East Pakistan (Today’s Bangladesh) who knew Bangla language fought for their recognition and identity in 1952. They fought for their mother tongue with the Government of Pakistan to recognise their language too as an official language.  But Government outlawed their protest and opened fire on the protestor to demolish the movement. In this incident, some peoples laid their life and many sustain critical injuries to preserve their linguistic identity. Later on, Bangla got the recognition as an official language due to widespread unrest in Pakistan.  

This was the first movement in the world when peoples fought for their identity and recognition of their Mother Language.

After efforts of Bangladesh, in 1999 UNESCO declared 21 February as International Mother Language Day. In order to save the language and culture associated with them from extinction. 

The theme of International Mother Language Day 

Every year this day is being celebrated with a theme and the  theme of Year-2021 is :

📘“Fostering multilingualism for inclusion in 

education and society,”👭

UNESCO believes education, based on the first language or mother tongue,

 must begin from the early years as early childhood care and education is the foundation of learning.

"We may have different religions, different languages, different coloured skin, but we all belong to one human race." -Kofi Annan

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