When the hunk of a football player kicks the football, it swerves towards the right and bounces off the goalpost back onto the field with the opponent gaining control of the ball. The striker’s team is disappointed. “Arey bailea…baizon huicho,” (Damn lady…effeminate that you are) one of his mates utters. As I witness this conversation, a runner jogging along the outer length of the football field, I ask in a loud husky voice, “Tuvem mahka apoila?” (Did you call me?) All the players steer their heads towards me with quizzical expressions. The ball is momentarily under the foot of another player. A weird moment hangs in the air.
The weirdness about language is that we have an uncanny relationship with it. At one level, it is ours. Amcho bhax…that’s what we feel most at home with. There is a feeling of comfort, hominess, and safety. We might even dream in it, and yet it limits us, as sometimes, our thoughts in one language may outweigh the possibilities that our mother tongue can make us imagine.
On another level, it can estrange us. Each language is shaped by relationships, power dynamics, and hierarchies. In using a word for someone or something, the person using that word also establishes and declares a relationship with that being or thing. For example, in Konkani, by calling another woman a chedi, we refer to her multiple relationships with other people, often as a slur. Yet, these words are only directed at women. They are not directed at men or transgender or non-binary people. For some of us, the gender binary is still a lens that governs the way we experience our world.
Just as a society evolves and becomes more aware of concepts of gender and sexuality, so too a language evolves. In fact, the more we use a language, the stronger it grows. From the perspective of how Konkani polices gender through its vocabulary, here is a list of some of words: baizon, bailea, bailot, ladys (derived from ‘lady’ in English) for an ‘effeminate’ man or boy; izzdo (derived from hijra in Hindi) or izzdem for a transgender person. Regarding sexuality, Konkani uses hozzo for a gay person (in Xaxti dialect) or bacao and boquis (derived from Portuguese)[1]. Most of these words are used derogatorily or usually with a twinge of forbiddenness or scandal. Interestingly, a word for lesbian is still wanting. Was it because it was unimaginable for those in power to conceive of two women being together?
As a young child, words like baizon and bailea were lavishly thrown at me. The sting of these words pricked nastier than that of a bee and I felt immensely vulnerable. Though I lived in Sant Estevam, an intimate island village where people knew your family history if you told them your parents’ names, I had no sense of connection to my village. My connection to my language estranged me. Such words like baizon and bailea, travel quickly as a nickname, like the words buranto (glassy perchlet, a type of fish) or kaso (tortoise) that probably have a story about how these words got associated with a person and all future offspring within that family. After finishing school, I took the first opportunity that life offered by escaping the island, and beginning afresh.
Over the years, I have grown comfortable in my skin, with my gender and my sexuality. The little child who once felt ashamed, has now grown up. The world around me has changed, and we have transgender, queer, bisexual, and lesbian and gay people proudly embracing themselves. Words only have power because we relinquish a bit of ourselves to the dynamic of how they get used. In every speech act, the speaker utters words, and the listener interprets those words to complete the meaning. What if the listener interprets the words from their own unique position but in ways that uplift their own social reality? What if new speakers invest meanings that can elevate other people’s social position?
What would happen if, when someone utters the word ‘chedi’, and all the women in the room proudly acknowledge that call? After all, not every person is talented or desirable enough to have multiple lovers or partners. Or, when someone says izzdo or hozzo, and folks in that space nod in agreement? These are moments when a language gets reinvigorated with new meanings and newer inflections. Thankfully, we are experiencing that transformation, as even amchi Konkani bhax is embracing this change. We no longer say, ‘dadlo baxen act kor’ (act like a man) or ‘bailea baxen bos’ (sit like a woman). People can act or sit in different ways. Nor do we use ‘bailot’ or ‘chedi’ as a slur to ridicule someone. Boys can be baizons and women may choose to be unabashed about their relationships. For long, the baizons and baileas, the izzdos, izzdems and hozzos were quiet, yet now we are finding our voice. These words have now appropriated power and pride. We have figured our place in the world, so let us be!
As our language offers us words, absorbing some and changing others, it opens up fresher possibilities and ways of being and existing. Perhaps, next time there is a weird moment – when someone responds, “Tuvem mahka apoila?” – we will take a pause and experience the beauty of how language can surprise us with its power.
An earlier version of this article was published in Marathi in the Goan Varta on April 21, 2024.
[1] Fernandes, K. F. (2024). In Search of the Queer in (Catholic) Konkani: Silence, Slurs and the Spectacular. In The Queer and the Vernacular Languages in India (pp. 204–220). Routledge India.
Cover Image: Photo by Patrick Tomasso on Unsplash
