110 Cultural Post #2

[David Kim]

There is a distinct distinction between formality and informality in Urdu. There are words that are befitting a formal situation and there are separate words that have the same meaning but are more suitable for informal situations. I found an example from an article I came across:  "there are two words meaning ‘water,’ پانی pānī and آب āb.  Words of older Hindustani or Sanskrit origin such as pānī are used coloquially, whereas words of Persian or Arabic origin such asāb are used in formal situations.”