Distribution of languages and religious groups of Sri Lanka on D.S. division and sector level according to the 1981 Census of Population and Housing, Indian Tamil dialect of Sri Lanka is primarily used in the central highlands of the country
Indian Tamil dialect of Sri Lanka or Upcountry Tamil dialect or Estate Tamil (ET) is a Tamil dialect spoken by the descendants of indentured South Indian labourers who were brought to Sri Lanka during British colonization and South Indians who migrated to Sri Lanka for better prospects. ET is often misunderstood as Indian Tamil as the people who speak this dialect can trace their ancestry back to South India but much research has not been done regarding this dialect due to the misunderstanding that there is absolutely no difference between ET and Indian Tamil.[1] However research shows that ET is a dialect that heavily differs from Indian Tamil for multiple reasons.
The ancestors of ET speakers migrated from different parts of South India and they spoke different dialects of Tamil. For example, grandmother for Pallar community was “attay” while for Kudiyar it was “ammayi”.[2] In the last century these different dialects of Indian Tamil co-existed in close proximity in the hill country and it evolved into what is currently known as Estate Tamil. Moreover there are dialectal differences within ET due to different types of language contact.[1] Language contact between the different dialects of Indian Tamil and Sinhala after Sinhala labourers also started working in tea and rubber plantations had a considerable impact in the development of ET as a separate dialect from Indian Tamil.
The geographical distance between the two dialects of Tamil, ET and Indian Tamil has also impacted the evolution of ET as a separate dialect. ET has been in Sri Lanka for over a century and as mentioned above has come into contact with a different language Sinhala. Moreover, ET has been exposed to different dialects of Tamil within Sri Lanka such as Jaffna Tamil which has also caused changes in ET. This shows that ET is indeed different from Indian Tamil.
There are phonological differences between the two dialects. Out of the consonants /b/d /D/ /j /g/ are voiced stops in Indian Tamil while in ET they occasionally occur as voiceless stops in loan words. For example, ‘bayam’ (fear) in Indian Tamil is “payam” in ET. Studies have identified that there are three distinctive nasals in Indian Tamil but the phonemic differences of these nasals are slowly fading away in ET. For example maɳam (smell) in Indian Tamil is manam in ET. ‘ɳ’ in ET occurs only in loan words or preceding /c/ and /ɳ/ in Indian Tamil is realized as /n/ in ET. For example ‘koɳjam’ (a little) in Indian Tamil is ‘koɳcam’ in ET.[1] Morphological differences can be found between Indian Tamil and ET as well. In Indian Tamil, /ooDa/ /uDaya/ and /kka/ are genitive case markers but in ET these case markers have slights variations such as /ooDa/ is /ooTa/ in ET, /uDaya/ is /uTaya/, /uTTu/ and /atu/ in ET.[1]
Thus, it is clear that ET is a different dialect from Indian Tamil as the different dialects of Indian Tamil that evolved into ET due to close proximity with each other and language and dialectal contact between ET, Sinhala and other dialects of Sri Lankan Tamil.
Notes
1 2 3 4 Kadurugamuwe, N. (1994). Estate Tamil: A morphosyntactic study(Unpublished doctoral dissertation).
↑ Wijeratne, W. M. (2009). Estate Tamil: A new variety of Tamil. 43-58.
Sinhalese people are an Indo-Aryan ethnic group native to the island of Sri Lanka. They were historically known as Hela people. They constitute about 75% of the Sri Lankan population and number more than 16.2 million. The Sinhalese identity is based on language, cultural heritage and nationality. The Sinhalese people speak Sinhala, an insular Indo-Aryan language, and are predominantly Theravada Buddhists, although a minority of Sinhalese follow branches of Christianity and other religions. Since 1815, they were broadly divided into two respective groups: The 'Up-country Sinhalese' in the central mountainous regions, and the 'Low-country Sinhalese' in the coastal regions; although both groups speak the same language, they are distinguished as they observe different cultural customs.
Tamil is a classical Dravidian language natively spoken by the Tamil people of South Asia. Tamil is an official language of the Indian state of Tamil Nadu, the sovereign nations of Sri Lanka and Singapore, and the Union Territory of Puducherry. Tamil is also spoken by significant minorities in the four other South Indian states of Kerala, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh and Telangana, and the Union Territory of the Andaman and Nicobar Islands. It is also spoken by the Tamil diaspora found in many countries, including Malaysia, Myanmar, South Africa, United Kingdom, United States, Canada, Australia and Mauritius. Tamil is also natively spoken by Sri Lankan Moors. One of 22 scheduled languages in the Constitution of India, Tamil was the first to be classified as a classical language of India.
The Vedda (Sinhala: වැද්දා [ˈvædːaː], Tamil: வேடர், or Wanniyalaeto, are a minority indigenous group of people in Sri Lanka who, among other sub-communities such as Coast Veddas, Anuradhapura Veddas and Bintenne Veddas, are accorded indigenous status. The Vedda minority in Sri Lanka may become completely assimilated. Most speak Sinhala instead of their indigenous languages, which are nearing extinction. It has been hypothesized that the Vedda were probably the earliest inhabitants of Sri Lanka and have lived on the island since before the arrival of other ethnic groups in India.
Sinhala script, also known as Sinhalese script, is a writing system used by the Sinhalese people and most Sri Lankans in Sri Lanka and elsewhere to write the Sinhala language, as well as the liturgical languages, Pali and Sanskrit. The Sinhalese Akṣara Mālāva, one of the Brahmic scripts, is a descendant of the Ancient Indian Brahmi script. It is also related to Grantha script.
Sinhala, is an Indo-Aryan language primarily spoken by the Sinhalese people of Sri Lanka, who make up the largest ethnic group on the island, numbering about 16 million. Sinhala is also spoken as the first language by other ethnic groups in Sri Lanka, totaling about 2 million people as of 2001. It is written using the Sinhala script, which is one of the Brahmic scripts; a descendant of the ancient Indian Brahmi script closely related to the Grantha script.
In addition to its classical and literary form, Malay had various regional dialects established after the rise of the Srivijaya empire in Sumatra, Indonesia. Also, Malay spread through interethnic contact and trade across the Malay archipelago as far as the Philippines. That contact resulted in a lingua franca that was called Bazaar Malay or low Malay and in Malay Melayu Pasar. It is generally believed that Bazaar Malay was a pidgin, influenced by contact among Malay, Hokkien, Portuguese, and Dutch traders.
Sri Lanka Indo-Portuguese, Ceylonese Portuguese Creole or Sri Lankan Portuguese Creole (SLPC) is a language spoken in Sri Lanka. While the predominant languages of the island are Sinhala and Tamil, the interaction of the Portuguese and the Sri Lankans led to the evolution of a new language, Sri Lanka Portuguese Creole (SLPC), which flourished as a lingua franca on the island for over 350 years. SLPC continues to be spoken by an unknown, extremely small population.
Prenasalized consonants are phonetic sequences of a nasal and an obstruent that behave phonologically like single consonants. The primary reason for considering them to be single consonants, rather than clusters as in English finger or member, lies in their behaviour; however, there may also be phonetic correlates which distinguish prenasalized consonants from clusters. Because of the additional difficulty in both articulation and timing, prenasalized fricatives and sonorants are not as common as prenasalized stops or affricates, and the presence of the former implies the latter.
Sri Lankan English (SLE) is the English language as it is used in Sri Lanka, a term dating from 1972. Sri Lankan English is principally categorised as the Standard Variety and the Nonstandard Variety, which is called as "Not Pot English". The classification of SLE as a separate dialect of English is controversial. English in Sri Lanka is spoken by approximately 23.8% of the population, and widely used for official and commercial purposes. Sri Lankan English being the native language of approximately 5400 people thus challenges Braj Kachru's placement of it in the Outer Circle. Furthermore, it is taught as a compulsory second language in local schools from grade one to thirteen, and Sri Lankans pay special attention on learning English both as children and adults. It is considered even today that access and exposure to English from one's childhood in Sri Lanka is to be born with a silver spoon in one's mouth.
Sri Lankan Tamils, also known as Ceylon Tamils or Eelam Tamils, are Tamils native to the South Asian island state of Sri Lanka. Today, they constitute a majority in the Northern Province, live in significant numbers in the Eastern Province and are in the minority throughout the rest of the country. 70% of Sri Lankan Tamils in Sri Lanka live in the Northern and Eastern provinces.
Negombo Tamils or Puttalam Tamils are the Tamil speaking ethnic Karavas who live in the western Gampaha and Puttalam districts of Sri Lanka. They are distinguished from other Tamils from the island nation by their unique dialects, one of which is known as Negombo Tamil dialect. Other sub categories of native Tamils of Sri Lanka are Jaffna Tamils or Northern Tamils and Batticalao Tamils or Eastern Tamils from the traditional Tamil dominant North and East of the Island nation. Negombo is a principal coastal city in the Gampaha District and Puttalam is also the principal city within the neighbouring Puttalam District.
The Sri Lankan Tamil dialects or Ceylon Tamil or commonly in Tamil language Eelam Tamil are a group of Tamil dialects used in Sri Lanka by its native Tamil people and Moors that is distinct from the dialects of Tamil spoken in Tamil Nadu. It is broadly categorized into three sub groups: Jaffna Tamil, Batticaloa Tamil, and Negombo Tamil dialects. But there are number of sub dialects within these broad regional dialects as well. These dialects are also used by ethnic groups other than Tamils and Moors such as Sinhalese people, Portuguese Burghers and the indigenous Coastal Vedda people.
Sri Lankan Moors are an ethnic minority group in Sri Lanka, comprising 9.2% of the country's total population. Most of them are native speakers of the Tamil language who also speak Sinhalese as a second language. They are predominantly followers of Islam. The Sri Lankan Muslim community is divided as Sri Lankan Moors, Indian Moors and Sri Lankan Malays depending on their history and traditions.
Negombo Tamil dialect or Negombo Fishermen's Tamil is a Sri Lankan Tamil language dialect used by the fishers of Negombo, Sri Lanka. This is just one of the many dialects used by the remnant population of formerly Tamil speaking people of the western Puttalam District and Gampaha District of Sri Lanka. Those who still identify them as ethnic Tamils are known as Negombo Tamils or as Puttalam Tamils. Although most residents of these districts identify them as ethnic Sinhalese some are bilingual in both the languages.
Sri Lankan place name etymology is characterized by the linguistic and ethnic diversity of the island of Sri Lanka through the ages and the position of the country in the centre of ancient and medieval sea trade routes. While typical Sri Lankan placenames of Sinhalese origin vastly dominate, toponyms which stem from Tamil, Dutch, English, Portuguese and Arabic also exist. In the past, the many composite or hybrid place names and the juxtaposition of Sinhala and Tamil placenames reflected the coexistence of people of both language groups. Today, however, toponyms and their etymologies are a source of heated political debate in the country as part of the political struggles between the majority Sinhalese and minority Sri Lankan Tamils.
Sri Lankan Creole Betawi Bazar Malay Language is a creole language spoken in Sri Lanka, formed as a mixture of Portuguese, Dutch, English, Arabic, Hokkien Chinese, Sinhala, Tamil and SōnagathThamizh, with Malay. It is traditionally spoken by the Sri Lankan Malays.
The indigenous languages of Malaysia belong to the Mon-Khmer and Malayo-Polynesian families. The national, or official, language is Malay which is the mother tongue of the majority Malay ethnic group. The main ethnic groups within Malaysia are the Malays, Chinese and Indians, with many other ethnic groups represented in smaller numbers, each with its own languages. The largest native languages spoken in East Malaysia are the Iban, Dusunic, and Kadazan languages. English is widely understood and spoken in service industries and is a compulsory subject in primary and secondary school. It is also the main language spoken in most private colleges and universities. English may take precedence over Malay in certain official contexts as provided for by the National Language Act, especially in the states of Sabah and Sarawak, where it may be the official working language.
Vedda is an endangered language that is used by the indigenous Vedda people of Sri Lanka. Additionally, communities such as Coast Veddas and Anuradhapura Veddas who do not strictly identify as Veddas also use words from the Vedda language in part for communication during hunting and/or for religious chants, throughout the island.
Tamilization is the cultural expansion of the Tamil people native to the southern part of India and the northern and eastern part of Sri Lanka.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply. Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.
