• Dr. Gakul Gogoi

ABSTRACT: Bilingualism is a natural phenomenon in North-East India. This region has a multi-linguistic feature i.e. each of the community has different languages and cultures, which means different languages are spoken. This language situation helps the people to become bilingual. Similarly, in Assam one of the many states of North-East various speech-community are residing. The Misings are one of the many tribal speech-community, co-enisted in this heterogeneous language situation. They speak in Mising language with the native speakers of Mising and in Assamese with the people speaking in other languages. Moreover, some of the Mising people also use Hindi and English besides Assamese for educational, economical and vocational purpose. In this paper we have tried to analyze the various definitions of bilingualism, which are developed by the linguists and an attempt has been made to understand the concept. It also discusses the various types of bilingualism and examines the nature of bilingualism of the Mising speech-community of Assam in light of the types of bilingualism identified by the researchers in linguistics. In the perspectives of language situation of Assam it also concentrates to study the real scenario of the Missing language. In the end of the study we have found various characteristics of bilingualism among the Mising speech-community i.e. they have together the characteristics of Stable bilingualism, Societal bilingualism, Folk bilingualism, Compound bilingualism, dominant bilingualism and Sequential bilingualism.

KEYWORDS: Bilingualism, Speech-community, Language situation, Mising language, Assamese Language, Language use, Language acquisition, Language skill.

"Bilingualism Among the Mising Speech-Community of Assam ", International Journal of Emerging Technologies and Innovative Research (www.jetir.org), ISSN:2349-5162, Vol.6, Issue 6, page no.545-553, June-2019, Available :http://www.jetir.org/papers/JETIR1907965.pdf

"Bilingualism Among the Mising Speech-Community of Assam ", International Journal of Emerging Technologies and Innovative Research (www.jetir.org | UGC and issn Approved), ISSN:2349-5162, Vol.6, Issue 6, page no. pp545-553, June-2019, Available at : http://www.jetir.org/papers/JETIR1907965.pdf