The example I’m thinking of is Urdu and Hindi. They’re different languages but have so much in common that in conversation there’s rarely a need to translate, but I can’t read or write a single word of the other language. So how did we end up speaking the same and writing different?
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Isn’t Urdu broadly just [Hindi, as spoken by Muslims], and vice versa? Well, since Muslims need to know how to read Arabic script to engage with the Quran, why spend the effort to learn to read and write two different ways, when you can just write your vernacular in the same alphabet you use for your culture’s sacred writings? Likewise with Hindu Hindi-speakers who need to be able to read the classical Sanskrit texts.
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