No Subject

[George Hart <ghart@socrates.berkeley.edu>]

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Selva writes,

>     But for Sanskritization, Malayalam would have been
>      southwestern Tamil. The relationship would have been
>      similar to TN Tamils and Tamil Eelam ( not as portrayed
>      in The Hindu though).

Selva, you know this isn't right.  The fact is that Malayalam can -- and
often is -- spoken with virtually no Sanskrit (just like Tamil).  But it is
still a different language -- has no verbal endings, different phonetics,
different endings (and none of this development is attributable to Sanskrit
influence).  In fact, as you know, Malayalam sometimes uses Dravidian words
where Tamil uses Sanskrit ones.  This is also true of Kannada and Telugu --
e.g. Kannada ugiru for nail and Telugu veyi for "thousand" (aayiram is from
sahasra).  BUT Tamil developed before Sanskrit influence became excessive,
and so it did not make allowance for Sanskrit sounds in the writing system.
It is no more or less Dravidian than the other Dravidian languages.
Languages evolve, and old Tamil evolved into two languages, modern Tamil
and Malayalam.

Selva, if people are going to start spelling "pancu" with a "j," then we
might as well give up -- a font standard cannot substitute for minimal
education and literacy.  If a Malayali were to write it this way, he/she
would immediately be corrected -- just as if I wrote "wate" instead of
"wait" in English.  GH.




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