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Opinions differ on whether Sanskrit is a living language. If we define a living language as one in which new coinages become widespread among its users (and not just its learners), is it living?

For comparison, Latin is a living language because it's still used in Vatican materials in which phrases have been coined for "internet" and "punk rock fans", for example.

Edit
In order to ground this question more firmly, here is a question: are there Sanskrit words for "telephone", "television", "internet", or anything else that has been invented since 1850 (the more recently the better), that are to a large extent accepted as standard in sizeable Sanskrit-using social scenes?

tell
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    Yes but Church Latin is a completely different language from Classical Latin, and it has no native speech community. The same is true of Sanskrit and Esperanto, for different reasons, and to a lesser extent of Classical Arabic. And to a still lesser extent to most national languages. – jlawler Aug 27 '23 at 16:50
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    So new Sanskrit coinages become widespread among its users? Have you got some examples or information as to how they become widespread? – tell Aug 27 '23 at 18:55
  • See also this question for some interesting information about the "Sanskrit villages" in India: https://linguistics.stackexchange.com/q/369/9781 – Sir Cornflakes Aug 28 '23 at 08:02

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The definition of "living language" given in the question is not used in linguistics. Instead, linguists define a living language as a language that is passed as a first language to the next generation of speakers.

By this definition Latin is as dead as a language can be, even though both Church Latin and Neo-Latin still evolve, e.g., by the addition of terms for new items invented nowadays. I'd say, Sanskrit is as dead as Latin, and the movement for the revival of Sanskrit has not changed this (see Is the Sanskrit spoken natively in pockets in India changing? for more information on Sanskrit villages in India).

EDIT: There are people that actively add modern terminology to Sanskrit, and this terminology is accepted by learned users of Sanskrit. I still hesitate to call this state of affairs a "living language", but the formal answer to the question is therefore "yes".

Sir Cornflakes
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  • So all linguists agree that Esperanto, in which new coinages become widespread, is not a living language? Anyway I have amended the title to "Is Sanskrit a living language according to this definition?" to make even clearer what was said in the body text of the post. It's new to me that some people use words to suggest that a language can evolve and be spoken natively too but not be living. – tell Aug 28 '23 at 09:23
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    There are denaskaj parolantoj (native speakers of Esperanto), born to Esperanto couples with no other common language than Esperanto. This makes a point for "Esperanto as a living language". – Sir Cornflakes Aug 28 '23 at 09:25
  • Yes that's true about Esperanto. That's only a very small proportion of the speakers, though, and I strongly doubt that they have a disproportionally large influence on the language's evolution. Thanks for bringing to my attention the native use of Sanskrit in some places in India, of which I was unaware. But how can you call Sanskrit dead if some people speak it natively?? – tell Aug 28 '23 at 09:27
  • The problem is that native learning of Sanskrit in the Sanskrit villages is impeded by several factors. One major obstacle identified in the sources cited in the answers is exogamy: Young woman from the Sanskrit villages marry partners outside their villages and go there, and young man marry partners from neighbouring villages with different languages to come to the Sanskrit villages. – Sir Cornflakes Aug 28 '23 at 09:33
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There is a page of recent Sanskrit neologisms here, including अन्तर्जाल [antarjāla] "internet", जालपृष्ठ [jālaspṛṣṭha] "webpage", दत्तनिधि [dattaniddhi] "database". Of course one can always dispute the existence of a new word, like "melty" or "internet", so there is always the possibility of arguing that a given word is not "widespread enough". Barring such an argument and given your definition (i.e. "lexically, not a closed corpus"), Latin and Sanskrit are living languages.

user6726
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