video | Going the Bilingual Way

The documentary allows us to look at a globally fundamental issue: the home language and school language disconnect. This film not only helps us understand one of the most crucial grievances with modern education and dialects but also shines a bright light on the actions that will save us from looking at the world as a standardized one-dimensional dystopia. The film takes us to some of the remotest parts of Maharashtra, India. More than 16 tribal dialects are spoken in Maharashtra, according to People's Linguistic Survey of India, 2013. Children speaking these dialects, attend schools where medium of instruction is the regional language Marathi, which is semantically and syntactically different than their home language. The unknown medium of instruction creates a lot of hurdles in their learning. There is however a wonderful solution. The documentary 'Going the Bilingual Way' captures the journey of finding this solution and its crucial role in conservation of our multilingual legacy.