One language can have more than one writing tradition
The University of Pennsylvania’s Punjabi programme introduces Gurmukhi and Shahmukhi as the language’s two scripts, associated broadly with India and Pakistan. That is a useful first orientation, rather than a rule assigning a script to every individual. Script describes a writing system; a reader’s spoken language and ability to read a particular alphabet are separate matters.[1]
The same programme distinguishes beginning, intermediate and advanced study, using authentic material as learners develop communication and reading skills. Our practical implication is to choose a script pathway for the material you want to read. A family letter, a printed book or a course requirement gives a more useful starting point than an assumed identity.[1]
The history is longer than the border
Sahar Afshar’s historical study of Gurmukhi printing describes Punjabi’s concurrent use of distinct writing systems as digraphia. It explains the strong modern association of Gurmukhi with Indian Punjab and Shahmukhi with Pakistani Punjab after Partition. The thesis also stresses that a writing system is not intrinsically limited to one language. These relationships are historical arrangements, not a property of the spoken sounds alone.[2]
Her account also places sacred Sikh texts beside secular poetry, stories and other uses of Gurmukhi. This prevents a narrow equation between a script and just one genre. To understand how a book reached readers, examine its patrons, printers, teaching institutions and audience, alongside the alphabet visible on the page.[2]
Follow the evidence of printing and reading
Afshar identifies an imbalance in the surviving material available for her research: she found abundant early Gurmukhi type evidence but difficulty locating comparable Shahmukhi printing records. She consequently narrowed the thesis’s scope. That research decision should not be recast as proof that one community lacked a literary or written culture; an archive’s surviving evidence shapes the history that can be written.[2]
Reading across the two traditions now involves practical learning as well as historical understanding. Penn’s emphasis on authentic texts offers one approach: work towards a real piece of reading, keep its original script and distinguish transliteration from translation. This is our learning recommendation. The present essay does not establish a single origin story for either script.[1]
Sources & notes
Source records include access dates and, where known, limits on what was examined. Checks used AI assistance; independent human or specialist review has not been completed.
- University of Pennsylvania, Department of South Asia Studies. The Punjabi Language ↗institutional reference · Source date: publication date not established · Locator: Opening script description; Punjabi at Penn curriculum paragraphs. Accessed 2026-10-31.Read complete programme page. Unverified population/ranking and broad scriptural-language claims are not used.Return to One language can have more than one writing tradition, paragraph 1 ↑Return to One language can have more than one writing tradition, paragraph 2 ↑Return to Follow the evidence of printing and reading, paragraph 2 ↑
- Sahar Afshar; Birmingham City University, PhD thesis, April 2022. Gurmukhi printing types: an historical analysis of British design, development, and distribution in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries ↗institutional reference · Source date: publication date not established · Locator: pp. 23–25, section 1.1.1; p. 59, script use and genres. Accessed 2026-10-31.Downloaded official repository PDF and read actual pages using pypdf. Scope and evidence imbalance explicitly attributed to this research.Return to The history is longer than the border, paragraph 1 ↑Return to The history is longer than the border, paragraph 2 ↑Return to Follow the evidence of printing and reading, paragraph 1 ↑
Record PH-JOU-0007 · English edition · human review not performed