On Tue, 2004-01-06 at 09:34, Dileep M. Kumar wrote:
On Mon, Jan 05, 2004 at 08:00:48PM +0530, Mahesh T. Pai wrote:
Dileep M. Kumar said on Mon, Jan 05, 2004 at 10:16:19AM +0530,:
In Malayalam we can call Free Software as "Swatantra Ganana Soothram". What do other Malayalees in this list say ?
While this is literally accurate, in modern Malayalam, `soothram' is understood as a `trick'.
Not for all, I suppose. :-)
In common usage, the word 'soothram' has acquired such a meaning. For most ordinary folk, 'soothram' would continue to mean 'trick'. On the other hand, is 'soothram' (in the other sense) a 'pure' Malayalam word? It has come from Sanskrit. For that matter, what is 'pure' Malayalam? We have borrowed so many words from other languages (jannal, mesa, stool, shirt, and even computer) that it is now difficult to say which word is 'pure' Malayalam. This is not the case in very ancient languages like Sanskrit and Tamil. That is why it is possible in these languages to build new words starting from roots. I guess these are two different ways of doing things, and one of them is, perhaps, more suitable in a given language or situation. Malayalam has a long history of borrowing from other languages and that is its strength. That is the strength of other world languages like English too. So we need not feel ashamed to borrow words from other languages. People have already started using the word 'software' and it has got into many documents and books including textbooks. In the situation, my opinion is that we can stick with the word.