Let’s keep Tamil alive

The first national Tamil youth conference in South Africa was held at the weekend by the Clairwood Tamil Institute. More than 120 delegates participated and a number of speakers addressed the ‘four pillars’ which formed the conference theme: history; education; arts and culture; and Tamil in society today for tomorrow. One of those who presented a paper was SARANYA DEVAN, a final-year clinical psychology student at UKZN, who outlined the role of spoken Tamil in reviving interest in the language

TO ALL WHO cherish the Tamil language, it gives me great pleasure to share with you a subject that is close to my heart – Spoken Tamil or Pechu Tamil.

There is no time to be discreet or diplomatic, hence I might as well tell it as it is.

The fact of the matter is that the future of spoken Tamil in South Africa is looking bleak.

The Tamil language is dying a slow and painful death. Advanced life support is urgently needed.

One’s mother tongue – in this case Tamil – is arguably more important than one’s religion. We lose our identity when we lose our language.

Throughout history, Tamils have been Hindus, Buddhists, Jains, Christians and Muslims, but they always identified as Tamils.

Regardless of their religious differences, all Tamils have contributed to Tamil culture and literature.

Knowledge of the language also opens you to a vast amount of work such as literature, music and drama, with which the Tamil language is rich and abundant.

An example of one such work is Sivani Chinnappan’s Kannagi Kovalan, a compelling dance drama from the ancient Tamil epic Silappathikaram, that was performed last week at Durban’s Playhouse on Friday

Historical works are almost entirely written in the Tamil language. To understand how these (the arts and history) have come to define us as a people and to understand in-depth who we are, requires a good knowledge of Tamil.

Sadly the Tamil language is hardly being spoken today – even by older folk.

A language that has survived thousands of years in Tamil Nadu has almost disappeared as a spoken language within 15 decades of its arrival in South Africa with our indentured forefathers.

All this wonderful history and its literature will be lost to us forever, because we would have lost our language.

What went wrong? Where did we fail this glorious language? What can we do to revive and sustain Tamil?

This is what I will briefly discuss.

At the outset, I must pay tribute to the many people and organisations who have worked hard over the years to keep Tamil alive.

I salute the Tamil teachers and religious and cultural organisations that have made sterling efforts to nurture and propagate Tamil, mainly through song, music, reading and writing.

The Clairwood Tamil Institute (CTI) – the host of this conference – is one such body, formed 90 years ago to keep alive the flames of the Tamil language and culture while also doing much humanitarian work.

It is therefore heartening that the CTI has realised the importance of rallying the youth to appreciate the rich legacy and heritage of the Tamil language and to commit to carrying the torch forward.

Others have spoken of the history of Tamil in South Africa, and repetition will be superfluous. What is more significant is the fate of the Tamil language today.

During the lifetime of the past generation, Tamil became threatened by English.

For the first few decades after the arrival of Tamils in South Africa, Tamil was spoken exclusively. Tamil was used for speaking at home, in the sugar cane fields, the railways and the coal mines.

The Tamils listened to Tamil music only, read Tamil newspapers and watched Tamil movies.

With the passage of time, ensuing generations became more educated in English. Before long, English which was socially, politically and economically dominant, and became more widespread as a spoken language among the descendants of the settlers. This was initially at the workplace, and later at home too, causing them to lose linguistic ties to their home country.

During the last five or six decades, but certainly more so since the dawn of democracy in 1994, embodiments of Indianness have been regarded as unimportant and have been slowly removed from the national psyche.

The removal of anything Indian from the former University of Durban-Westville (UDW) also did not help sustain learnings about the Indian.

The impact of the closure of Indian studies at the former UDW not only weakened the Indian participation in the newly configured University of Kwa-Zulu-Natal, but had a serious impact on the community and its ability to continue Indian cultural studies.

The UDW Indian languages programmes sustained the schools’ Indian language curriculum by offering training to the teachers of Indian languages.

Since the closure of the UDW Indian studies, the academic training of teachers in these subjects has been drastically affected, to the extent that today candidates who are seeking training in these subjects are unable to find a properly structured programme with properly trained lecturers.

Recently Tamil teachers had to acquire training in Chennai, India, thanks to Dr Mickey Chetty and the International Movement for Tamil Culture.

Another major blow for Tamil was when no Indian languages were featured among the country’s 11 official languages when democracy was ushered in 22 years ago.

Indians were frequently reminded by ruling party politicians that they should stop regarding India as their motherland.

Slowly the teaching of Indian languages at schools became neglected. Whereas there was a time when scores of schools taught Tamil up to matric level to hundreds of pupils, today only a handful of pupils are learning Tamil at school.

Grandparents

Grandparents and parents have stopped speaking to children in Tamil – or the other Indian languages – at home. Today young Indians in South Africa do not communicate in their vernacular, be it Tamil, Telugu, Hindi, Urdu or Gujarati.

Also contributing to the decline in popularity of Tamil as a medium of communication has been the lack of interest in Tamil media.

In days gone by, Tamil movies opened simultaneously in South Africa and in India. There was great interest in Tamil songs from the movies. Singing these songs kept the Tamil language alive.

Today Hollywood films have come to represent contemporary world culture, and English language movies find greater favour among young Indians than Tamil and Hindi movies do in South Africa.

Support even for blockbuster Tamil movies is not sustained by vigorous marketing efforts by theatre companies, and hence the Tamil community is being denied a lifeline to the Tamil language.

Over the years, it also became fashionable to speak only in English. Tamil became regarded as old-fashioned.

Even grandparents suddenly wanted to sound as though they were chic and cool, and began speaking in broken English.

Thus the older folk who were the custodians of good Tamil abandoned their responsibility of ensuring the Tamil language passed from one generation to the next. Hence Tamil has become lost in a sense of nostalgia, which does not enable it to be a modern language.

So how do we save Indian languages from becoming extinct in South Africa? The answer is simple: use the spoken form of the languages more often.

Languages are conduits of human heritage and when they die, we lose the history and narrative gems contained in the literature.

Language diversity must be preserved at all costs if we don’t want to become a monolingual species. Remember that you, and only you, can keep your language alive.

Therefore, the required action must follow to restore Tamil to its former glory in South Africa. In today’s competitive world, it is not enough to do anything in a lukewarm or half-hearted way. There must be unswerving commitment.

There is urgent need for the fresh breeze of Tamil Nadu to blow in South Africa. By this is implied that a Tamil Renaissance in South Africa is necessary today to restore Tamil to its former glory, at least in a spoken form, so that the language is still alive tomorrow.

First people should stop feeling embarrassed while speaking in Tamil. For a start, clasp your hands together and greet Tamil friends and relatives with a spirited “Vanakkum”.

Try updating your statuses on Facebook in Tamil and share with your Tamil friends. Don’t be afraid to use an English word or two if you are not sure of the Tamil word. Start little chat groups where you exchange notes in Tamil.

Take pride and encourage the community to use Tamil at home and even in public spaces when you meet another Tamil. Muslims are not shy to speak in Urdu in public.

Movies

Borrow Tamil movies and learn a few new Tamil words while following the English sub-titles.

Join a Tamil school. The Merebank Tamil School Society runs vibrant Tamil classes each afternoon.

Find those people who still have a good working knowledge of Tamil and use them to their fullest to impart their linguistic jewels to you.

Those behind attempts to launch Southside Radio should consider launching Tamil Youth Radio. Canada alone has six online Tamil stations.

It will require concerted effort by all in the community to keep the Tamil language alive and relevant to our young. If Tamil is to be a living language, it has to be used actively and spontaneously by young Tamil students. The community and homes play a critical role.

The key to making sure you don’t lose your culture is to speak in your mother tongue. Only a spoken language has a chance of survival.

When our mother tongue is a beautiful language like Tamil, that has survived the trials of time, it is all the more a reason to hold on to it.

The youth are the leaders and architects of our future. I urge you to keep Tamil alive.

Vazhga Tamil Mozhi – Nandri - Vanakkum.