The glossary of sociolinguistic terms in Lingua Links Library defines the Recorded Text Test as “a tool used to evaluate comprehension of a language or dialect consisting of a short text spoken by a mother
tongue speaker of the language variety being tested. Subjects listen to the text twice, and during the second audition answer questions about the meaning of the text in home language or dialect, which have
been interspersed in the texts at appropriate places.” For a fuller description of RTT, refer to Blair 1990.
3.3 RTT procedure
The basic procedure of RTT involves taking a text from variety X and testing it in variety Y. A text of three to five minutes in duration is recorded from a mother tongue speaker of the language. Then, simple
content questions, formulated with the help of a mother tongue speaker, are interspersed in the appropriate places throughout the text. Before taking to test point, the text is validated as the
representation of the variety by getting at least ten people from the same village to listen to the text. This gate test is called the Hometown Test HTT.
Once the Hometown Test is completed with an expected average score, the text is ready to be used as a representation of that particular variety in other areas. Before conducting the test, a story from the
test point is played as a passing story to ensure that people are familiar with the procedure. This story also has to go through the same procedure of making questions and placing them at proper places in the
text. After the native story, the test story is then played. The answers to the questions are written down for further evaluation.
The test tape in each site starts with an introduction and practice text in the native variety followed with HTT and RTTs. The subjects are screened before taking the RTT test in order to avoid the
influence of non-familiarity with testing procedures. If the subject fails to understand the procedure after the HTT, he is not a right candidate to conduct the RTT test. The Hometown text is helpful to check the
reliability of each question involved in the intelligibility test and eliminate questions which are not appropriate. There are post HTT and RTT questions after the respective texts to further investigate about
variety. This is expected to reflect the attitude of the subject toward the test variety, perceptional difference of the test variety from the native variety and the level of contact that exists between the
communities. The results of the test are interpreted based on these responses as well.
3.4 Interpretation of RTT data
Once the test is finished, the score is calculated to project the intelligibility of the community. Each person’s average score is considered as the degree of personal understanding of the variety, and the
average score of the total subjects is taken as an indicator of intelligibility of the test variety. To have a better understanding of the inherent intelligibility, the standard deviation is calculated. The relationship
between the RTT score and standard deviation is explained in table 6. Table 6. Relationship between test averages and standard deviation
Standard Deviation High
Low
Average Score
High Situation 1:
Many people understand the story well, but some
have difficulty. Situation 2:
Most people understand the story.
Low Situation 3:
Many people cannot understand the story, but
a few are able to answer correctly.
Situation 4: Few people are able to
understand the story.
Standard deviation is interpreted based on the sample and test situation. A standard deviation of less than ten is interpreted as low and twelve to fifteen as high. It may be impossible and inappropriate
to set a boundary line when we interpret the average score, because it is not a test conducted in a classroom or laboratory but rather is field-administered. The rule of thumb for interpreting RTT result is
that above 80 percent is adequate intelligibility and less than 60 percent is inadequate intelligibility.
3.5 Test sites
The main objective of this study was to investigate the intelligibility of Dungra Bhili among Noiri speaking people of Maharashtra and Madhya Pradesh. The Dungra Bhili survey team had developed a
Dungra Bhili tiger story from Ambadungar village and had tested it among Barutiyas called Bhiloris by Dungra Bhili team in two locations: one in Akkalkua tahsil Sari village and the other in Dhadgaon
tahsil Asali village of Maharashtra. The same Dungra Bhili story was used in the present survey. Two RTTs, one in Chillare and one in Astambha, were administrated in this survey. Only one story had been
developed as HTT and used in both sites as a passing story. In Astambha the Dungra Bhili story was played without developing an HTT from the village. But here the story from Chillare village was used as
a passing story by translating the questions into Astambha variety.
Chillare village in Shirpur tahsil represents the southeast extreme of Noiri and hence this was chosen as the farthest test point among Noiras from the Dungra Bhili area. Based on lexical similarity
comparison, a second proposed site for the test was Gomon in Akkalkua tahsil, because it shows the least relationship to other Noiri wordlists. The survey team had developed a test tape in Gomon without
developing an HTT to do a Rapid RTT,
21
but it could not be conducted because of some procedural reasons. Astambha in Dhadgaon tahsil was selected as the next test site because it shows an equidistant
relationship with other Noiri varieties, including Gomon based on lexical study. Table 7. Tahsil, district and state of test and reference sites
Language Story name andor village name Tahsil
District State
Dungra Bhili Tiger story, Ambadungar
Kawant Vadodara
Gujarat Noiri
Pick pocketing story, Chillare Shirpur
Dhule Maharashtra
Noiri Astambha
Dhadgaon Nandurbar
Maharashtra
3.5.1 Chillare
This village is in Shirpur tahsil of Dhule district. It is located three kilometres from the Agra-Mumbai national highway. There is bus service to the village. Almost all the people in the village belong to the
Noiri community, and the language is widely spoken in the village. Researchers could not communicate to a good portion of the community without an interpreter. This is one of the Noiri villages where we
can see some educated people compared to many other Noiri villages.
3.5.2 Astambha
The village is situated about 40 kilometres from Dhadgaon, and the area is connected by road. State transport’s buses reach Asali, the nearest village, and from there people have to walk seven kilometres
through hilly roads to reach Astambha. The only other alternative is to rely on a private Jeep, which plies between Dhadgaon and Astambha once a day. This village is much behind in education and other
21
Rapid RTT is a test conducted in a village without developing an HTT because of various reasons by using a text tape already developed for another village.
facilities. Out of fifteen people who volunteered to take the test, only ten were qualified. The rest of them could not follow the procedure. There is a primary school in the village, but children are not
interested in education.
3.6 Result and analysis
Table 8 shows the results of the Recorded Text Test. Columns list the villages where each story was tested, with story names and the villages from which it was developed shown in rows. The Hometown
Test results are italicised and bolded in the table.
Table 8. Results of Recorded Text Testing Test Points
Reference Points Ambadungar
Chillare Astambha
Ambadungar Dungra Bhili tiger
story Avg
Sd No
96 7
10
95 5
13 88
7 10
Chillare Noiri pickpocketing
story Avg
Sd No
96 5
13
88 12.5
10
3.6.1 Dungra Bhili tiger story
The average score of Noiri speaking subjects on the Dungra Bhili story was 88 percent in Astambha and 95 percent in Chillare, which is comparatively high, with low standard deviation 7 and 5, respectively,
pointing to adequate comprehension of the Dungra Bhili text. The results are in line with situation 2 in table 6: most people understood the story. However the result cannot be interpreted only in terms of a
numerical threshold, but rather must be evaluated in light of other indicators of intelligibility, such as lexical similarity, dialect opinions and reported patterns of contact and communication.
As explained in the section 3.3, post RTTHTT questions were asked to investigate the attitude of Noiri speakers towards the Dungra Bhili variety. All subjects in Astambha and eight out of thirteen
subjects in Chillare, when asked in what language they thought the story was told, reported that the Dungra Bhili story is in Noiri. But many of them felt the variety was different in terms of words,
pronunciation or style. People in Chillare seemed to have more contact with the outside world than people in Astambha do. When answering the second post RTT question “Where do you think the story
teller is from?”, more than half of the Chillare subjects said that the story was told in the dialect of Lakadiya Hanuman the nearest village, about three kilometres away.
22
More than half of the Astambha subjects were non-responsive to this question. Others responded that the story was from the bank of the
Narmada or from Taloda.
23
One educated man in the village, after going through the Dungra Bhili written material, reported the language as pure, but very different from their variety. According to him
they can understand Vasavi materials better than Dungra Bhili.
22
They explained it by saying that the word ono is used in the text, which is present in language of Lakadiya
Hanuman. It is reported that Noiri is spoken in Lakadiya Hanuman too.
23
Because of a dam project, some villages were relocated to Taloda, one of the tahsils in Nandurbar.
3.6.2 Noiri pickpocketing story
The Chillare pickpocketing story, used in Astambha as a passing story instead of HTT, scored an average of 88 percent. The story got a standard deviation of 12.5, which is on the threshold of high standard
deviation. The result almost resembles situation 1 explained in table 6: many people understood the story, but some had difficulty. Among the ten subjects, only six responded to the last of the post RTT
questions “Which story was easier to understand?”. All six of them said they understood the Noiri pickpocketing story better than the Dungra Bhili tiger story. Even two subjects who scored less on the
Chillare story reported in the same way. Three subjects scored an average of 70–75 percent; among these three two of them were females. These three subjects did not score well for the first question because
they did not understand the procedure well.
24
The same subjects failed in the seventh question also, which contains a small dialectical difference.
25
These things might have caused the high standard deviation. Excluding the two subjects who scored 70 percent, the score would be 92.5 percent, with a
standard deviation of 9.
4 Bilingualism, language use and language attitude
4.1 Bilingualism
It is appropriate and inevitable to evaluate the bilingualism level of a community before we attempt to make any decision about a language program. The focus of this research on bilingualism was minimal
because of the overall emphasis on studying Dungra Bhili intelligibility. But the researchers felt the need to make reasonable assumptions about the bilingualism of Noiras in Hindi and Marathi. We used
bilingualism data from previous research among different Bhili subgroups to encourage the mother tongue advocates to accelerate their language promotion among Noiras. We supplemented this
information with the field observation of researchers.
4.1.1 Pilot bilingualism test among Bhils in Northern Dhule district
This data of research is obtained from Watters 2013. Though the study was completed in 1988, its results could still be valid for making assumptions about Noira bilingualism. The Marathi Ramkissan story
RTT was the tool used for pilot bilingualism testing. The test was administered to sixty-nine subjects from seven villages. The results of the test are given in table 9.
Table 9. Results of Bilingualism test among Bhils of Dhule district Educated
Uneducated AverageMean
86 62
Standard Deviation 9.56
24.06 Sample Size
40 29
Those who have achieved to standard five and above in school or who are literate in the Devanagari script are considered educated. Those who have not achieved
beyond standard four, or who have not been to school, are considered uneducated.
24
The first question was repeated more than one time during the test to help them understand the procedure. Even after going through the practice story, some of the subjects could not follow the procedure.
25
The seventh question is ‘Where did the riot happen?’ For ‘riot’ different words are used in the test point and reference point
The result is interpreted as follows: “Those outside of the educational domain are seen to have a competence of a most basic nature in Marathi, a result of frequent contact. Those who received some
education have gone beyond the level of competence that exists as a result of contact to attain to higher levels of bilingualism” Watters 2013:39–40. It should be noted that the bilingualism test using a
narrative text measures bilingual ability up to a maximum of 2 or 2+ on the Foreign Service Institute FSI scale. A subgroup analysis of the results reveals that the Vasava community scored the highest.
Compared to Vasavas, Noiras are far behind in education and development.
4.1.2 SRT test among Rathwi speakers of Madhya Pradesh
Rathwas who speak Rathwi are the largest subgroup of Barelas notified as a Scheduled Tribe along with Bhils in the state of Madhya Pradesh. A Sociolinguistic Study of BareliPauri and Related Languages
2000 is the source of this data. The research was carried out in 1998. Sentence repetition test was used to assess the bilingual ability. One of the SRT sites was Upla village in Rajpur tahsil of Badwani district
Madhya Pradesh. The overall literacy rate of Upla is nine percent. The SRT result of Upla village is summarised in table 10.
Table 10. Hindi SRT results among Rathwi speakers of Upla village Total Uneducated Primary Higher
Average 16
9 12
26 RPE level
2 1+
1+ 3
Sample 28
11 7
10 Standard deviation
10 5
4 8
Uneducated and primary educated scored only level 1+ on RPE scale, much lower than the required level 3+ for the effective use of any materials in a second language. More than 90 percent of
the Rathwa Barelas in Upla fall under this category. Hence it was concluded that Rathwa Barelas are not adequately bilingual to use anything beyond basic materials in the second language. The Rathwa Barelas
in Madhya Pradesh are the same as Rathwa Pauras in Maharashtra. Noiras are very behind in education, have less contact with other people and live in more remote areas than Pauras.
4.1.3 Bilingualism of Noiras
From the above discussion, the following facts can be gleaned: 1. Most of the Noiri villages are too interior when compared to Paura villages to back up with
considerable contact and motivation for notable bilingualism. 2. Noiras are neither in a level of education nor commendably interested for it to expect and
anticipate adequate bilingualism. Had we felt the need of a bilingualism test, the priority would have gone to Astambha, one of the good Noiri sample villages. The overall literacy rate of the
village is less than one percent or 0.85 percent.
26
3. Earlier bilingualism studies give a picture of an inadequate degree of bilingualism even among those groups who are more exposed to education and contact.
Hence, it may be reasonable to assume that the majority of Noiras are not adequately bilingual in Hindi or Marathi.
26
The figure is calculated from the 1991 census data.
4.2 Language use and attitude
Language use refers to the choice of languages in different social situations, whereas language attitude deals with how people view their language. The study about language use and attitude is subjective and
is inter-related with many other social characteristics, such as bilingualism, contact, education and so forth. A detailed study of language use and attitude was not carried out in this survey. The study of these
among Noiras was carried out through informal interviews and observation.
It was observed that the vernacular is used in the important domains of daily life. People are not adequately bilingual in any other varieties. It was found out during our stay in the village that even
people who can manage a second language try to use their own variety among themselves even in the presence of an outsider. It was reported that social workers and non-tribals in the area learn the
language to keep their contact with Noiras.
With regard to language attitude, two differing attitudes are found among Noiras based on their settlements. Noiras in the western part of the survey area have a positive attitude about the variety
whereas people in the eastern area, who stay around Pauras, attribute a lesser status to their own variety and do not feel the need to develop it as a written language. More than one fourth of the Noiras are
concentrated in this eastern area. A man from Shirpur tahsil eastern part reported that they are not interested in language development. However, the vernacular is being used in the important domains of
daily life even by them.
Based on observation and informal interviews, the following comments would be reasonable about language use and attitude of Noiras:
1. The use of language is strong in important domains, such as home and village. 2. Inadequate bilingualism prevents the vast majority of them from using any language other than
Noiri. 3. Even those Noiras who hold comparatively less prestige about their own variety continue to
speak their language in their traditional domain. Therefore it may be assumed that Noiri would continue to be used in the foreseeable future.
5 Conclusion
5.1 Extensibility of Dungra Bhili
