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Dzongkha needs more avenues

1 December 2009

I agree to what Tshering Choden, a class XII student from Thimphu, said in her letter to editor in November 13-20 issue of Bhutan Observer. The way we take Dzongkha forward itself needs to be properly planned. We know that written Dzongkha was started only in the late 1960s and it is just a few decades old. But over the years, it grew quite well, especially in the late 1990s. But as Bhutan joined the global network of internet, television and other forms of media, the momentum of Dzongkha was challenged by the global language, English.

The numerous efforts by Dzongkha Development Commission in various forms to improve the language did not seem to bear much fruit. Media organizations in the country faced a lot of difficulties in publishing their Dzongkha edition. Bhutan Observer even suspended the publication of Dzongkha. Bhutan Times inserted a few pages of Dzongkha edition in the English publication to cut the cost.

Business Bhutan did the same. And when Kuensel, the country’s oldest paper went daily this year, it did a similar thing by combining the Dzongkha and English editions.

Today, we rarely see any banners and posters used during occasions written in Dzongkha. This means, the utility of Dzongkha is losing. I used to love Dzongkha very much during my school days. I participated in numerous activities to promote Dzongkha and I was rewarded too for that.

But today, as I grew older and complete my graduation, I don’t find any place to use Dzongkha except in a few occasions. This has demotivated me too and I switched to writing in English.

And now I am more confident to write in English than in Dzongkha. In short, if Dzongkha has to gain momentum, there have to be more avenues to apply Dzongkha and more jobs for Dzongkha graduates apart from teaching.

Unless that is put in place, Dzongkha will face even more barriers to move forward.

By Sonam Tshering

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Posted by Bhutan Observer · Filed Under Voices 

Comments

3 Responses to “Dzongkha needs more avenues”

  1. norbu on December 2nd, 2009 2:12 pm

    Quote “And now I am more confident to write in English than in Dzongkha.” Tshering! this shows how ardently you have been involved in promoting our language. By switching yourself to English……….. you minus one from the likes of dzongkha promoters. It should not like people saying “he is smoking, I am also going to smoke”. You add figure to the total number of of smokers.

  2. Zangpo on December 7th, 2009 12:22 pm

    I am bilingual in Dzongkha & English. But as most of the correspondences in our offices are found in English, I am loosing my hope and interest in using Dzongkha as my officers and office colleagues don’t bother for Dzongkha letters. Although they know our national language, they don’t use it. Something serious must be done by concerned authority. All have started blaming in not usage of our national language, but no action seems to be taken from any one in implementing the orders in our hand.

  3. Zangpo on December 9th, 2009 11:55 am

    My school-going children are not interested in our National Language? Why? I asked. No job for Dzongkha was the answer. So I also agreed as I didn’t get promotion or any trainings outside the country simply because my background qualification is Dzongkha. So we ourselves are killing ourselves.

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