When a Language Begins to Disappear: My Kashmiri Story of Shame, Memory, and Return

How Languages Fade

Languages rarely disappear suddenly. They fade slowly when people no longer feel safe, valued, or rewarded for speaking them. A language begins to decline when parents stop passing it on to their children, often because another language becomes linked to education, opportunity, status, or power. Across history, colonization, migration, war, urbanization, globalization, and cultural assimilation have erased thousands of languages. Sometimes this happens through direct suppression, and other times through quieter forces like schools, media, and social expectations that gradually make a mother tongue feel less useful, less modern, or even shameful. Over time, the language retreats from public life into private spaces, and eventually, what is lost is not just words, but entire worlds of memory, emotion, storytelling, and identity.

Growing Up in Kashmir

I grew up in Kashmir, a place shaped by beauty, conflict, and generations of unresolved grief. At home, we spoke Kashmiri fluently and proudly. Contrary to stereotypes, it was not limited to rural or less educated families. In many upper-middle-class homes like mine, Kashmiri was the language of intimacy, humor, storytelling, and emotional connection. It was simply life. But outside the home, everything shifted. In school and public spaces, Kashmiri slowly disappeared, replaced by languages tied to status, education, and modern identity.

The School That Taught Me Silence

I went to a missionary convent school where English represented intelligence, success, and modernity, while Urdu existed socially but Kashmiri was absent. The school had students from different class backgrounds—some middle class, some elite, some from families already globalized through migration or education. Even as a child, I noticed something unspoken: the more “elite” someone appeared, the less likely they were to speak Kashmiri. No one explicitly told me to be ashamed of my language, but I absorbed it in subtle ways—in reactions, in tone, in the way Kashmiri sounded “too local,” and in how confidence seemed easier in English. Slowly, I learned to separate my world into two: Kashmiri at home, English and Urdu outside.

Leaving Kashmir and Losing Shame

When I moved to the United States, something unexpected happened. The shame around my language softened. Distance made things lighter, and survival naturally pulled me into English as my dominant language for work, parenting, and daily life. Over time, I became fully assimilated. Kashmiri slowly faded into the background of my identity, still emotionally present but rarely spoken.

Returning Through Mental Health Work

Then came COVID, and something in me shifted. I began thinking more deeply about home, silence, trauma, and especially mental health stigma in Kashmiri communities. I felt an unexpected pull to return to my mother tongue. So I began creating mental health content in Kashmiri. I didn’t know what to expect, but people listened. Some videos reached thousands of viewers, and slowly a community formed. What mattered most was not visibility, but the sense that something emotionally buried had started to breathe again. For the first time, mental health conversations were happening in Kashmiri.

The Double Shame

But alongside this healing, I also noticed something painful: a double shame. Shame around mental health, and shame around speaking Kashmiri itself. I heard again and again that Kashmiri is considered “not professional,” “not modern,” or even low status in certain spaces. In some environments, people avoid speaking it publicly altogether. It hurt, but it didn’t surprise me, because I once carried the same belief. What struck me most was the contradiction: Kashmiri is still deeply alive at home, emotionally rich and expressive, but increasingly invisible in public life. Younger generations often shift toward English and Hindi because those languages feel tied to opportunity, safety, and mobility.

After 2019: A Subtle Shift

After 2019, when Article 370 was removed, something shifted again in how Kashmir is governed and experienced. For many, it felt like another layer of distance from autonomy, identity, and cultural self-definition. I do not write about this as a political analyst, but as someone who has lived through its emotional ripple. Political change and cultural change are deeply intertwined, and language always sits at the center of that intersection.

Slowing Down, But Not Letting Go

At some point, I began slowing down my podcast work. Not because I stopped caring, but because life became fuller and more demanding in other ways, and sustaining content in Kashmiri required emotional energy and time. Still, I remain proud of it. Something real happened—people began talking about mental health in Kashmiri. That shift matters deeply. Maybe not everything is meant to scale forever. Maybe some work exists simply to reopen a door.

What I Carry With Me

What stays with me most is this: I once felt ashamed of my own language. Then I learned to speak it again in public. And somewhere between those two versions of myself, healing happened—not just for me, but for others too. I often think about languages like Hebrew and how revival is possible when communities choose to bring a language back into daily life. I wonder if Kashmiris could ever move in that direction too—not through policy alone, but through pride, daily speech, and everyday courage.

Because in the end, a language does not survive in institutions. It survives in mouths, in homes, in relationships, and in love. And that is what I am still trying to hold onto. by

Blog by Dr. Najmun.

Artificial Intelligence was utilized in formatting and editing of this blog.

Image by: @naveeday from Unsplash