KARBI SPEECH COMMUNITY AND ITS PROBLEMS IN EDUCATION: A SOCIOLINGUISTIC PERSPECTIVE
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.65009/06m9sg74Keywords:
Karbi language, Karbi speech community, mother tongue-based education, multilingual education, sociolinguistics, indigenous education, language policy, Assam,,Abstract
Language is a fundamental determinant of educational participation, learning, cultural identity,
and social inclusion, particularly in multilingual and linguistically diverse societies. The Karbi
speech community of Assam represents an important indigenous linguistic group whose
educational experiences are shaped by the interaction between the Karbi language and dominant
languages used in formal schooling. Although Karbi functions as a primary language of
communication within the community, formal education in many Karbi-speaking areas is largely
mediated through Assamese, Hindi, or English. This linguistic discontinuity can create barriers to
classroom comprehension, participation, literacy development, and educational attainment, while
also contributing to the gradual marginalization of the Karbi language in formal domains. This
paper examines the major educational challenges confronting the Karbi speech community from a
sociolinguistic perspective, with particular attention to the limited availability of mother tongue
based education, inadequate Karbi-language educational materials, shortage of trained Karbi
speaking teachers, changing parental language preferences, language shift among younger
generations, and gaps between language-policy provisions and their implementation. The paper
further argues that strengthening Karbi within the educational system does not require replacing
Assamese, Hindi, or English; rather, a structured multilingual approach can enable students to
develop strong foundational literacy in their mother tongue while progressively acquiring
additional languages. Based on the identified challenges, the study proposes measures including
the development of Karbi-medium and bilingual instructional resources, recruitment and
professional development of Karbi-speaking teachers, integration of local cultural knowledge into
curricula, greater community participation, systematic language documentation, and stronger
monitoring of policy implementation. A coordinated mother tongue-based multilingual education
framework can therefore contribute to educational inclusion, linguistic sustainability, cultural
continuity, and improved learning opportunities for Karbi-speaking children.
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