On 22/01/07, teun spaans <teun.spaans(a)gmail.com>
wrote:
The low representation of Indian citizens
surprises me. I met one or two at
the english wikipedia / commons, perhaps they tend to prefer the english
wiki above their local languages?
This appears to be the case. The educated classes tend to learn in
English and to talk to each other in English. There are many native
languages in India, but the one that all educated people are likely to
speak is English, so that's the one that gets spoken. English is
regarded as higher status than the local languages.
That and by being foreign English is not seen as giving an advantage to
a ny particular part of the country as would be the case with a native
language.
Ec