The influence of language on thought

Under the binary gender system followed by India, where Hindi is most widely spoken, gender norms and roles play a key role in determining how people function in society. Being Transgender or part of the LGBTQ+ Community in Indian society comes with its own set of struggles.

Indian conservative society at its root is not open to communities or ideas that are outside of the ‘status quo’. People who have genders or sexualities that differ from the “normal” are often forced into leading lives that are separate from their families.

They are referred to as the people of ‘Kinnar Samaj’ which essentially means men and women who do not have completely developed genitals or are associated with demeaning Hindi slang words such as ‘Chhakkas’ and ‘Hijras’ which are both used with the intention of offending those who do not identify as either of the two ‘acceptable’ genders.

Linguistic processes are of great influence in the fundamentals of thought. They unconsciously shape our basic cognition and perceptions into our decisions, ideas and thoughts. Language immensely contributes to our thinking and those who speak the same language naturally adopt similar characteristics and values.

Language has our attention trained in a way that allows us to navigate particular situations and adopt, understand certain belief systems. This itself contributes to the creation of a culture (in its most basic form). Because language, culture and thought are interconnected, a potential cause for this non inclusive attitude towards people who are a part of the LGBTQ+ community in India is the grammatically gendered nature of the Hindi language.

 Like the English language Hindi  has natural gender such as, boy, girl and man, woman etc. but unlike English it has gendered grammar (a gendered language itself shows a bias to a particular sex) which means that even nouns have grammatical gender. In Hindi, Nouns are divided into two main sections, namely पुलिंग “Masculine,” and स्त्रीलिंग “Feminine.”. Words such as Book and table in English don’t have a gender however in Hindi they are female, and same applies for words such as House and Door which are male.

This process of dividing nouns into their specific grammatical gender – without necessarily thinking of gender – takes place automatically for native Hindi speakers.

However, for those learning Hindi as a foreign language these gendered grammatical rules are confusing and often come across as non-inclusive of gender fluidity, transgender and non-binary genders.

This makes it difficult for those who do not identify within the two “traditional” genders to navigate the language. It also contributes to the stigmatization and socialisation of younger members of Indian society who speak Hindi as their first language.

This causes the build-up of rigidity in society that upholds non-inclusivity and discrimination against people who do not fit into the mold that is created.

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