What's My Mother Tongue?

“Looks like you’re from North India. So Hindi must be your mother tongue?”

It’s a question I’ve heard countless times - lightly spoken, yet heavy with assumption. We love neat labels: North Indian, South Indian, as though a country as diverse as India could be folded into tidy halves. But India stretches far beyond those borders - westward and eastward, into the southwest, the northeast, and all the spaces beyond and in between. Each region hums with its own languages, stories, and ways of being.

This exquisite picture book turns our gaze to Nagaland, in India’s northeast, and honours its rich tapestry of languages and dialects. Zhevili is asked to introduce herself in her mother tongue on Language Day. But she speaks English - so what, then, is her mother tongue? Walk beside her on a tender journey of identity as she uncovers the fragile beauty of Nagaland’s disappearing languages.

And this is precisely why voices like Abokali Jimomi and Canato Jimo matter. Through their words and art, they open a rare window into lived experiences, inviting us not just to see, but to truly listen.