Look at the hierarchy in the Kerala Police department.

A1. DGP

A2. IG

A3. DIG

A4. SP

A5. ASP

B1. SP (non-IPS)

B2. DySP

B3. CI

B4. SI

C1. SI (Promoted)

C2. ASI

C3. Head Constable / Senior Civil Police Officer

C4. Constable / Civil Police Officer

There is a slight level of inaccuracy in the above written hierarchy. However, for what I aim to write here, the above-given table might suffice.

In the local Malabari language, let us think that from the top of the table to its bottom, there would be Ingal👆 – Inhi👇 (ഇങ്ങൾ - ഇഞ്ഞി) steps.

Once this much has been understood, let us imagine this scene

A 30-year old IPS rank SP and a 27-year old police constable (shipai) are sitting in a room.

Between them, the verbal coding of Ingal👆 – Inhi👇 would be there.

If one were to see only this scene, a feeling might come that between them, there is only a single step of hierarchy.

The feeling might be that the police shipai rank person can easily, by displaying his personal prowess, his family’s grand social status and his own big-time political connections, get to become very close to the IPS official, be his close friend, and even address him in a friendly manner with an Inhi (lowest / intimate you).

Even if the word of addressing is not lowered to Inhi, a feeling can arise in the onlooker that the IPS officer is just one step higher than the police constable.

However, this is not the reality. Actually both of them are on different steps on a hierarchy ladder with a number of Ingal👆 – Inhi👇 (ഇങ്ങൾ - ഇഞ്ഞി) steps in-between them.   Even though these steps are not physically visible, their existence is a physical reality.

There is something that needs to be mentioned here in a cursory manner.

That is, all police department personnel right down to the lowest police shipai rank can address any one of the ordinary citizens with an Inhi (lowest you). That is, more than 3 crore (30 million) people in Kerala can be seen as subordinate to the lowest police department employee in Kerala.

However, in the case of the ordinary people in Kerala, each individual can use this high grade pejorative form of You &c. words only towards his or her own immediate relatives or employees who are subordinate to them in age or rank.

This is a very astonishing level of difference in stature between a police constable and an ordinary citizen, created solely by verbal codes.

This is also some kind of a human stature difference that cannot be found inside English.

I can speak about a huge social structure design connected to this. However, that cannot be done as of now.

However, this much can be mentioned.  Even ordinary persons are on some steps in some or other Ingal👆 – Inhi👇 ladder or ladders.

Due to this very reason, a feudal language speaking person is not at all like a native-Englishman.

Inside Malabar, each and every individual has a very precise or vague position in various Ingal👆 – Inhi👇 ladders.

Others will make haste and take effort to find this position or level of him or her.

For, it is by calculating or sensing this level that the society, family members, officialdom and others decide as to how to behave and interact with him or her.

These kinds of phenomena are not there in English at all.

There is something else also that needs to be mentioned in a very brief manner.

Both Communism as well as Islam might be philosophies that might be promoting the ideas of social equality.  However, neither of these philosophies has been able to erase the Ingal👆 – Inhi👇 ladders that are there in the local social communication. Due to this very reason, these kinds of philosophies will not be able to set up any kind of social equality anywhere over here.

I will mention one more item and bring today’s writing to a halt.

In feudal languages, all individuals are positioned on various kinds of Ingal👆 – Inhi👇 ladders.  Due to this reason, the personality dignity that is seen in native-English individuals cannot be seen in feudal language speakers.

There is a saying over here that when a person wears a police uniform, his behaviour will change drastically. The same is the case with feudal language speakers.

Feudal language speaking individuals are persons who live wearing the uniform of a multitude of Ingal👆 – Inhi👇 ladders, one after another or even simultaneously.  Each time he or she moves from one ladder to another or move from one step to another on the same ladder, that individual’s behaviour and attitude will change. For, his relative heights and lowliness would have changed.

Each one of these persons would be acting as per the dictates of various commands of servitude and servility, knowingly or even without being aware of it.

This shall be incessantly affecting and influencing their attitude for keeping their word, honesty, punctuality and many other personality features.  It might even be possible to find contradictory behavioural features in the same person, on many occasions.

What has been mentioned here is an ordinary mental feature. Not a mental disease feature.   

However, for an ordinary native-English speaker to display such inconsistencies in behaviour, he or she would need to have some mental illness issue.

It may be understood that many kinds of mental illness conditions are created by the actions and reactions of the verbal codes in languages.  

There are many other things to be mentioned in this very streaming down of words. Let me write them in my next post.