Abhishek Avtans

Abhishek Avtans teaches Indic languages and linguistics at Leiden University (the Netherlands). He tweets at @avtansa and avtansa.bsky.social

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Abhishek Avtans

Mohandas Gandhi, with Indian independence leaders Jawaharlal Nehru and Vallabhai Patel, at a sweeper’s colony in Delhi, circa 1946. The practice of associating speech with social position has deep historical roots in Southasia, and caste identity embeds itself even in basic vocabulary.

How caste pervades Southasian languages

Abhishek Avtans

25 Nov 2025

Packing tea on a Ceylon estate, circa 1905. In the late 19th century, coffee plantations were swept by a fungal epidemic called coffee leaf rust. Following the coffee crash, tea quickly replaced coffee and the tea trade became the economic backbone of the British colonies, leading to the migration and settlement of Indian Tamil labourers in Ceylon.

Languages and labour on tea estates in South India and Sri Lanka

Abhishek Avtans

04 Jul 2025

Assamese women plucking tea leaves, circa 1890. The establishment of commercial tea plantations in the region by the British engendered the migration of diverse groups of people to tea-growing areas to work there as labourers. Many of these workers belonged to marginalised communities, and they brought their eclectic languages along to their new homes.

The languages of tea-estate workers in Assam and Darjeeling

Abhishek Avtans

20 Jan 2025

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