Advantages: Provides a visual representation of other communities participants interact with, how well they feel they understand those varieties, how their language may or may not be altered in these
circumstances and their attitudes about other varieties.
Disadvantages: May seem complicated or redundant, but each step contributes to a fuller picture of the local perception of the language situation. Emic perspectives do not always match linguistic reality.
Appreciative Inquiry Description and purpose: This tool helps community members dream and discuss the possibilities for their
language and begin planning how they can achieve those dreams. It also shows what the community sees as most important for their language.
Procedure: Participants discuss things in their language or culture that have made them happy or proud. They are then invited to think about how they might build upon these good things they have identified,
or identify dreams they have for their language. Next they discuss what dreams might be accomplished sooner and which ones will take longer. Then they identify which dreams are most important to them.
Finally, participants are asked if they would like to choose a dream they would like to create a plan for and begin deciding on what the first steps should be, who will be involved and when the plan will be put
into action. Like dialect mapping, this was facilitated by two trained Dangaura Tharu speakers. Complete steps of Appreciative Inquiry are in Appendix F.
Advantages: Creates space and opportunity for community discussion of good things that are currently taking place, their goals and dreams and concludes with creating their own plan of action for a goal they
have chosen if they so wish. It is adaptable for various situations.
Disadvantages: It requires facilitators to have strong linguistic and cultural command for effective group facilitation. If not properly framed, the facilitation may raise false hopes of outside assistance in reaching
their goals.
3.3 Subject selection
Subject quotas for this survey are based on a convenience sample. It focuses on four demographic groups gender, age, education and language variety, as these factors are known to influence language use and
attitudes. People in these demographic groups often have varying levels of exposure to other languages.
3.3.1 Wordlists and RSQ elicitation subject selection
There are four requirements for subjects chosen for wordlists and recorded story elicitation. These criteria are as follows:
1. Subject has grown up in the village under study, lives there now and if they have lived elsewhere, it was not for a significant amount of recent time
2
. 2. Subject has at least one parent from the target mother tongue.
3. Subject has at least one parent from the village under study and that parent spoke the mother tongue L1 with them.
4. Subject speaks L1 first and best.
2
It is difficult to define a specific time period e.g. more than the last five years for “a significant amount of recent time.” Thus, this criterion is intentionally subjective as it depends on how long the subject lived elsewhere and how
long they have been back in the village relative to their age.
3.3.2 Informal interview subject selection
The informal interview schedule requires that only criteria numbers one and two section 3.3.1 be met in order for a subject to be eligible. In each language variety a minimum of 12 informal interviews were
administered stratified by age and gender. Educational background was also accounted for during data collection and analysis. For this analysis, literate persons were classified as educated, which generally
corresponded with the completion of primary level four.
Table 1. Sample size for informal interview by age and gender
Sample size by strata Age
Total Young 15–34
Old 35+
Gender Male
3 3
6 Female
3 3
6 Total
6 6
12
3.3.3 Recorded Story Question subject selection
Subjects chosen for listening to and responding to the RSQs met the first three screening criteria that was used for the RSQ storyteller section 3.3.1. In each language variety a minimum of ten RSQ tests were
administered.
3.3.4 Participatory Method subject selection
Appreciative Inquiry and dialect mapping are facilitated for groups in each community. There is no limit imposed on how many people may be involved although a group size between five and ten individuals is
preferable. It is also preferred for various demographics gender, age and education to be represented in each group if possible. There is no screening process for those involved in participatory methods.
However, notes were taken regarding who was present in order to account for possible bias.
4 Lexical similarity
Lexical similarity is a measure of the relative similarity of a sample of words from two speech varieties. Similarity percentages are determined by calculating the percentage of words in one speech variety that
are pronounced the same or in a very similar way to the words in another speech variety. Specifically, this survey used the comparison method outlined in Blair 1990: 31–32, further explained in Appendix
A.2. It is generally accepted that lexical similarity percentages below 60 indicate that the compared lists represent different languages. Lexical similarity above 60 requires intelligibility testing to confirm
if the varieties are dialects of the same language or if they are different languages. This survey compares five 316-item wordlists. The lexical similarity percentages among the five Tharu wordlists are displayed
in table 2.
Table 2. Lexical similarity percentages matrix
Malhoriya
88 Deukhuri
83 84
Dangaura
84 81
76 Desauriya
77 74
70 74
Kathariya
Table 2 shows that the lexical similarity percentages vary from a high of 88 between Malhoriya and Deukhuri to a low of 70 between Dangaura and Kathariya. No comparison falls below the cutoff
60 where they would be considered separate languages. Malhoriya and Deukhuri have the highest average lexical similarity with all other varieties.
The wordlist from Dangaura shared higher similarity with those taken in Malhoriya 83 and Deukhuri 84 than with Desauriya 76 or Kathariya 70. This suggests a greater potential for
intelligibility challenges with Desauriya and Kathariya. Wordlist data shows that Malhoriya and Deukhuri share higher lexical similarity with Dangaura and
Desauriya. Dangaura shares high lexical similarity with Deukhuri and Malhoriya. Kathariya is the most lexically variant of these wordlists.
5 Dialect attitudes and emic perspectives
One goal of this survey was to investigate the emic insider perspectives of each community in regards to dialect boundaries and assess attitudes toward Dangaura, Deukhuri and Malhoriya varieties. This gives
a more complete overview of the language situation than linguistic data alone can provide. Although reported similarity requires further testing, reported differences are generally more reliable. The
following sections are divided into each variety Dangaura, Deukhuri and Malhoriya and begin with the opinions expressed by dialect mapping participants regarding their own language situation, including
perceived boundaries in speech differences. Informal interview responses are then discussed which suggest minimal contact between varieties and opinions regarding different speech varieties. Lastly,
attitudes toward the variety are discussed, based on data collected through RSQs and other tools when applicable. Although the interview and RSQ sample size in each site was not large, we believe they still
provide helpful indicators towards these research questions.
One of the questions included in dialect mapping was about the development of written materials in Tharu. When groups were asked, assuming no materials had yet been developed, what the best variety
for material development would be, each chose their own variety as their first choice. The next nearest geographically variety was always their second choice. This provides no consensus on any one dialect
that all groups agreed would be best for the development of materials in Tharu.
Given the large geographic area covered by the varieties in this survey nearly 200 km between the farthest two villages, it is not surprising that speakers of some speech varieties have never heard of nor
had contact with speakers of some other varieties. During dialect mapping facilitations in this survey, this was often the case. For example, participants in Belganar, Dang Dangaura Tharu had heard of
Malhoriya and Kathariya varieties, but had never met anyone that speaks either of those varieties.
5.1 Attitudes and perspectives toward Dangaura
