From: ssankara@magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu (Sornam Sankara)
Subject: Naangaam Tamil
Keywords: science, Tamil, education, language
Organization: The Ohio State University
Date: Fri, 24 Jul 1992 03:00:14 GMT


    " anaivarum oru kai uyarthittal
      anaigaL pala nam kattidalam  "



Whenever somebody starts a discussion about scientific Tamil in TN, the first
thing he/she addresses is that modification/reduction of Tamil alphabets.  The
controversies over this issue never allowed the scholars to move beyond this
issue.  It is true that Prof.V.S.Kuzhanthai Samy, ThinamaNi editor Iravatham
Mahadevan and other thinamaNi writers do a serious research on this and suggest
improvements.  But they still remain as suggestions because of differet views
among themselves.   My personal opinion is that we need not give so much
importance for this issue because we need to prepare the language and the
people than the Tamil alphabets.   Why should one expect Tamil alphabets to
be similar to English in number and representation.  As long as we are able to
use all the alphabets in computers and equipments, that is fine.  Apart from
the 247 alphabets we should be able to write 'krantha ezhuththukkaL'.  I would
like to refer Dr.Srinivasan's article on TASCII (Tamil Standard Code for
Information Interchange) appeared in J. Tamil Studies, Dec 1987 (I expect
Dr.Srinivasan  to give us more insight into this).


     Much more than reforming the letters we need to reform the people
involved.  There are three important group of people who should give up their
present state of lethargy, pessimism or egos and work together.


(i) Linguists:


     Linguists are the top among them  to be consulted for any development of
languages.  Linguistics comprises the general theories about language, the
techniques and the concepts related to a description of the structures of a
language, the principles and processes involved in the changes that take place
from period to period in a language, the principles and the concepts involved
in comparing languages and the adaptation of all the above for some practical
purpose.  Unfortunately in India, linguistics is one of the neglected
discipiline and many think that linguistics is learning some language or
literature etc. It is a formal science and involves a knowledge of humanities
and sciences.  Though there have been many good linguists in India who time and
again stress the developments of Indian languages but are not taken seriously
by the government and the people.  Those linguists are also to be blamed for
their strict adherence to academic research.


(ii)  Scientists:


     They should give up the wrong attitude of "Science in English only" and
realize the importance of mother tongue education for the growth of our
society.  Very often they ignore linguists and the language pundits as if only
science is the challenging discipline or profession.  A scientist attains
perfection only when his achievements are understood and recognized by ordinary
people too.  How long we can allow brain drain ?  How long we can train our
professionals by spending lot of money, export our expertise for a lower price
and  import the products at a higher price ?



(iii) Language pundits:



     Here I restrict my comments to Tamil Pundits.  The main impediments for
the development of Tamil as a medium for science education are most of the
Tamil pundits and by their orthodox fanatism they hamper the growth of Tamil.
Just because they learnt Tamil literature or they know how to speak in pure
Tamil or write poems, they exceed their limits in dictating their rights over
Tamil.  They never realize the fact that there will not be any people to
recognize their talents or appreciate their creations if scientific Tamil is
not developed.  They could utilize their Tamil expertise in helping the
scientists in stead of lecturing on outdated issues like "Kannaki Vs Seetha".
They can also read popular science articles and invlove in coining technical
terms.

       They should also give up their fanatical attitude against already
popular Sanskrit or English words. "Bus" is better than "pEroonthu" and 'cycle'
is better than 'mithi vandi' or 'eeruruLi' etc.  There are unnecessary fears
about Sanskrit on one side and there is a glamour for Sanskrit names or words
on the other side.  Japanese language has accepted Chinese 'Kanchi' ideographs
and their 'Hirahana' alphabet system was created just to write words foreign to
Japanese languages.  So Japanese accept some English technical terms and write
in Hirahana scripts.  Japanese language has not died because of these changes.
Only if a language is safeguarded totally from the realities, it will die.
This is what Bharathiyar meant as "mellath Thamizh ini chacum".  Most of the
technical terms in English were derived from Greek or Latin.



(iv) Tamil People :


     Tamil people have to change their hypocritical view about language.  On
the one hand we talk high about Tamil and its pride.  But when it comes to
practice, they seek pride in speaking English and are very happy if their wards
speak English before going to school.  I have seen many Tamil Association
meetings where people show their oratory skills in Pure tamil and come down and
converse in English in informal discussions.  When the government, which is
supposed to take care of the overall interests of any society, fails miserably,
the people have the responsibility of working together.

     Moreover we should have a tendency to read and write 'heavy' or
'intellectual' stuff in Tamil.  A language is not just for writing poems or
reading gossips about films etc.  There are already a few magazines and
individuals doing remarkable jobs in popularising science.  "Kalaikkadir' and
"manjari' (is it still coming ?)  have been doing this service for a long time
though lately the articles of 'kalaikkadir' have become pure 'verbatim'
translations of their English originals.  Sujatha is one of the fine writers
who presents scientific facts in very simple and interesting language and he is
writing  in the popular magazines too.  Recently 'thuLir' is a very good
science magazine for the children.  We should encourage such magazines.  There
are many other small groups and magazines working in various corners
(Mr.Ragupathy pointed out such efforts).


  If all of us are convinced that we can succeed, then we can achieve within no
time.  All along I have been writing this for the combined efforts of Tamils
all over the world beyond national boundaries though I am not knowledgeable
about the examples in Srilanka, Malaysia  in this direction.


  In the next few articles, I will write about "language for science' in
general and with respect to Tamil.



S. Sankarapandi

ssankara@magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu
Newsgroups: soc.culture.tamil