Goa has a rich culture. Music and football are two things that run in the blood of Goans. In Goa we have multiple religions living together in complete harmony.Goa might be a small state but has zeal that cannot be compared with any other state. Goans are multilingual though the mother tongue of the state is konkani, Goans speak other languages such as Marathi and Portuguese.
According to a census done in India, konkani speakers are the most multilingual community. One of the factors is the migration of people from the other states. While the Portuguese language has made its way into goa due to the Portuguese colonization in Goa.
The Konkani language has different accent from north to the south of Goa, which greatly vary from each other. The Konkani accent in south Goan accent is called ‘saxtti’.
This is not the only difference, an individual in the Hindu faith will have a slightly different tone or will use words that vary while speaking than an individual from the Catholic faith. This is because the Catholics have a more Portuguese dominance when they speak konkani where as the Hindus don’t have as much Portuguese influence.
In present day Konkani is written in five scripts, that is Devanagari, Roman, kannada, Malayalam and Perso-Arabic. Devanagari is the official one amongst the five, in Goa and Maharashtra. The famous tiatr industry in Goa on the other hand uses the Roman script(Romi script) to write its productions.
The language of Konkani has travelled worldwide as many Goans have gone abroad and have not forgotten their ‘mainche bhaas’ (mother tongue) keeping the language alive. In Goa there aren’t many takers for it today, many are able to speak Konkani but aren’t able read and write it. Due to this there might have been a slow decline in the language.
Goa has a vibrant culture and many of the traditions are preserved and practiced by the Goans even today. Importance of Konkani language needs to be thought to youngsters for the language to keep thriving!
