A decade ago, when the U.S. Department of State named Hindi as one of the world’s must-learn languages, it was mainly aspiring government servants who were keen to pick up the Indian tongue because doing so gained them bonus points in the U.S. foreign service exam. The Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Central Investigative Agency also offered better jobs to employees who had learnt the language.
But with India poised to be a global superpower, experts say the demand for Hindi classes has shot up in recent years, particularly in the U.S.
Ryan Spencer, a Seattle-based middle school student, begins his Sunday mornings with an hour-long Skype call to India.
The agenda? Mastering the Hindi alphabet.
In April, after a family vacation to the northern Indian state of Uttar Pradesh, the 12-year-old’s father Richie Spencer hired a Varanasi-based Hindi professor to teach Ryan the basics of the language via Skype.
Hindi among Westerners. Among them is Ali Taqi, who in 2009 founded Zabaan — a New Delhi-based language institution – with a fellow American.
Last year, Zabaan delivered 490 Hindi lessons over Skype, about seven times more than in 2010, when the institution began teaching over the Web. A chunk of their traffic comes from the U.S.
- Toni Randall
- Teri Randall, an aspiring American diplomat, began taking Hindi lessons over Skype in March.
“The interest in Hindi in America is huge,” Mr. Taqi, a former Hindi teacher at University of Washington, said. Job profiles of those who enroll online range from aspiring diplomats and social workers to college students and professionals reallocating to India, he adds.
“I can learn at my own pace,” Teri Randall, a 50-year-old Californian, said about learning Hindi over Skype. Ms. Randall, an aspiring diplomat, enrolled for Zabaan’s online classes in March after she was shortlisted for the final round of the U.S. foreign service exam last November.
She hopes her fluency in Hindi will help strengthen her candidacy for the foreign services. “I’d love to service in India one day,” Ms. Randall, a filmmaker, said.
“Its rich history and religious diversity is hard to give a miss,” she added.
http://blogs.wsj.com/indiarealtime/2013/07/08/namaste-usa-hindi-lessons-a-hit-abroad/?mod=e2tw
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