On the Process of Creation of Proto-Bangla (Bengali): The Case of Language Contact

Traditional Indo-Aryan linguistics posits that Bengali evolved through linear descent from Magadhi Prakrit over 1,000 years. However, the framework fails to account for the multilingual complexity of Bengal’s linguistic landscape and the disappearance of transitional varieties. This study challenges conventional historical-comparative approaches to Bengali language development by applying language contact theory to explain the creation of Proto-Bangla. Using qualitative analysis of historical inscriptions, colonial administrative records, and modern linguistic research, I demonstrate that Proto-Bangla arose through sustained contact between Indo-Aryan superstrate languages and non-Aryan substrate languages (Austroasiatic, Tibeto-Burman, and Dravidian) across the Banglavarta region from the 5th century BCE onwards. I reveal that political assimilation policies, Aryanization, Buddhicization, Hinduization, and Islamization, created multilingual environments with pidginization and creolization processes. I identify three key language contact phenomena: language maintenance through borrowing and structural convergence, creation of new contact languages through pidginization-creolization cycles, and language shift resulting in substrate influence on Indo-Aryan varieties.