Kusunda is not a language many people outside of Nepal will have ever heard of. Unless drastic action is taken, this will be even more true in the not so distant future, as Kusunda may be about to become extinct.
There are some 120 native languages of Nepal belonging to the Indo-Aryan, Sino-Tibetan, Austro-Asiatic and Dravidian language families. The official language of Nepal is Nepali, originally called Gorkhali, which is estimated to have 25 million native speakers as of a 2011 census.
Nepali is one of 22 official languages of India, which is mostly spoken in some north eastern parts of India. In addition, the influence of the Nepali language in India can be seen in the state of Sikkim as well as the Darjeeling district of West Bengal, where it has been officially considered as the official language.
As Nepal’s national identity has become established, the Nepali language has been very popular as well, as an effective tool of communication between speakers of various languages in the country. According to some linguists, that due to Nepali being so influential, some other Nepal languages are now being negatively affected. There are plenty of issues concerning the the language diversity of the Nepali people.
Nepal is rich in history, culture, languages and people. However, behind this fact, Nepal is experiencing problems in preserving their dying native languages in the country. In western Nepal, a 75 year-old local woman is claimed to be the only person still alive in Nepal who fluently speaks the Kusunda language. Many linguists are struggling to understand the Kusunda tribe and its language; they believe that Kusunda is an ‘isolate’, for it does not appear to be related to any other language of the world.
Due to the phonological, morphological, syntactical and lexical uniqueness of the Kusunda language, linguists and the last Kusunda language speaker are worried about how to be able to work together in preserving this mysterious dying language of Nepal.
Both linguists and Gyani Maiya, the last speaker of Kusunda are sad that if the Kusunda language becomes extinct, an important part of the Nepali heritage and culture will be lost forever. Although there are still other people from the Kusunda tribe still alive, none of them understand nor speak Kusunda .
Nepal is just one of the many multilingual countries in the world. Unfortunately, it is not blessed with having a strict policy in preserving the Kusunda language, which is an essential component in the culture of a community.
As the Kusunda language dies in the history of Nepal, the culture of the Kusunda tribe will vanish completely and not be recognized in the national identity of the Nepalese.
Experts hope that the Nepali government will implement some specific programme to preserve this language and to protect the dying culture of the Kusunda tribe. It is bothersome and sad to think that Kusunda language will soon disappear as the last native speaker of this language leaves in the face of earth.
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