Sarnami Hindustani
Indo-Aryan koiné language of Suriname
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Through British Raj
Sarnami is considered to be the mother tongue of the Indo-Surinamese people and is mainly spoken in the Nickerie and Saramacca districts of Suriname, and due to migration in the Netherlands, Netherlands Antilles, Guyana, United States, Canada, and French Guiana.
Origins
The word Sarnami literally means Surinamese. The name Sarnami Hindustani was first used in 1961 by Jnan Hansdev Adhin.
The language emerged mainly through the mixing of different dialects or language variants from Northern India and southern Nepal, the areas from which the approximately 34,000 indentured labourers were brought to Suriname between 1873 and 1916 by the Dutch colonial government via the British, to replace the African slaves who had been freed.
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Usage
Sarnami is the third-most spoken language in Suriname after Dutch and Sranan Tongo and the mother tongue of approximately 500,000 of the Surinamese diaspora. Sarnami is also spoken by many immigrants in the Netherlands. Outside Suriname, other variants of Caribbean Hindustani are also spoken by Indo-Caribbean people in other Caribbean countries. Compared to other varieties of Caribbean Hindustani, Sarnami is still widely spoken, especially in Suriname and the Netherlands.
Hindustani (Standard Hindi-Standard Urdu) which has also influenced the language is separately considered a prestige language within Suriname, Sarnami is generally seen as a vernacular, and sometimes also considered to be a heritage language.
The difference with Standard Hindustani is mainly in the grammar. Sarnami, does not have the two cases of Hindi. Sarnami is also for example grammatically closer, to Bengali than it is to Hindi. An influence from Dutch on Sarnami grammar is, that the stem of the verb and the imperative mood are the same, meaning the syntax of the two languages is almost the same.
Literature
The first major Indo-Surinamese intellectual was Munshi Rahman Khan, with other major ones including Jit Narain, Rabin Baldewsingh, Chitra Gajadin, Cándani, Bhai, Raj Mohan and more.
Music
Baithak Gana is the primary form of music where Sarnami is used. It is also used for other forms of music including folk music, classical music, bhajans and qawwali's.