I recently analyzed around fifty episodes of “Shark Tank India”, a TV program where participants mainly present their new startup ideas mostly in the Hindi language. However, what stood out was that English words accounted for approximately fifty percent of all the language used by entrepreneurs during their pitches. This mixed language usage of Hindi and English words which is commonly known as ‘Hinglish’, reflects a significant yet subtle shift in Indian linguistics and culture over time. At the same time this language blend also raises several issues pertaining to language purity, cultural identity and global influence over local languages.

This tendency to blend local languages with English is usually more apparent across Asia where the colonial pasts of many nations have to some extent elevated the status of the English language.

India, Singapore or the Philippines for instance have incorporated English into their societies at different levels and this has slowly blended with local languages to fit specific historical and cultural contexts. Europe, however, shows a contrasting situation. Although English holds a strong position in Europe especially in business as well as academia, its integration with the indigenous languages has taken place without historical colonial influence. French, Germany and Spain are some of the European countries with strong linguistic identities. English in these countries is predominantly used here as a second language. Both indigenous languages and English have stood distinctly, and we do not see a mixture or blend as seen in the Asian........

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