Malayalam (;[Laurie Bauer, 2007, The Linguistics Student's Handbook, Edinburgh, p. 300.] , ) is a Dravidian language spoken in the state of Kerala and the union territories of Lakshadweep and Puducherry (Mahé district) by the Malayali people. It is one of 22 scheduled languages of India. Malayalam was designated a "Classical Language of India" in 2013.
The origin of Malayalam remains a matter of dispute among scholars. The mainstream view holds that Malayalam descends from a western coastal dialect of early Middle Tamil and separated from it sometime between the 9th and 13th centuries,["There has been a tendency among historical linguists to think of Malayalam as having diverged
directly from Tamil (the Tamil spoken from ancient times in what is today
Kerala), perhaps as late as the thirteenth century. But this view is almost
certainly wrong. Tamil and Malayalam must have separated from one another at
a much earlier stage, perhaps around the middle of the first millennium A.D., as
we can see from several surviving archaic features of Malayalam."] although this is generally rejected by historical linguists.[S.V. Shanmugam (1976). "Formation and Development of Malayalam", Indian Literature, Vol. 19, No. 3 (May–June 1976), pp. 5–30. "Yet, some scholars of Malayalam still believe that Malayalam should have originated independently from the Proto-Dravidian at a very early stage ... The native scholars are unwilling to accept Malayalam as an ausbau language; instead they take it to be an abstand language 'language by distance' contrary to historical evidence (pp.9–10)".] The Quilon Syrian copper plates of 849/850 CE are considered by some to be the oldest available inscription written in Old Malayalam. However, the existence of Old Malayalam is sometimes disputed by scholars.
The earliest script used to write Malayalam was the Vatteluttu script.
Robert Caldwell describes the extent of Malayalam in the 19th century as extending from the vicinity of Kumbla in the north where it supersedes with Tulu language to Kanyakumari in the south, where it begins to be superseded by Tamil language,
Etymology
In a 7th-century poem written by the Tamil poet
Sambandar the people of Kerala are referred to as
malaiyāḷar (mountain people).
[ (p.21-50 of journal)] The word is also said to originate from the words , meaning '
mountain', and , meaning '
region' or '-ship' (as in "township"); thus translates directly as 'the
mountain region'. The term
Malabar Coast was used as an alternative term for
Malayalam in foreign trade circles to denote the southwestern coast of the Indian peninsula, which also means
The land of hills.
[C. A. Innes and F. B. Evans, Malabar and Anjengo, volume 1, Madras District Gazetteers (Madras: Government Press, 1915), p. 2.][M. T. Narayanan, Agrarian Relations in Late Medieval Malabar (New Delhi: Northern Book Centre, 2003), xvi–xvii.] The term originally referred to the western hilly
land of the
Chera dynasty (later
and the Kingdom of Cochin),
Mushika dynasty (later
Kolathunadu), and
Ay kingdom (later
Travancore), and only later became the name of its language.
The language Malayalam was alternatively called , , , , , , , and until the early 19th century CE.
[Malabar Manual (1887), William Logan, Calicut]
The earliest extant literary works in the regional language of present-day Kerala probably date back to as early as the 12th century. At that time, the language was differentiated by the name Kerala Bhasha. The earliest mention of Malayalam as a language is found outside of Kerala in the 15th century Telugu language work Śrībhīmēśvarapurāṇamu by Śrīnātha.
Prior to this period, the people of Kerala usually referred to their language as "Tamil", and both terms overlapped into the British Raj.
History
Due to the geographical isolation of the
Malabar Coast from the rest of the Indian peninsula due to the presence of the
Western Ghats mountain ranges which lie parallel to the coast, the dialect of
Old Tamil spoken in
Kerala was different from that spoken in
Tamil Nadu.
The mainstream view holds that Malayalam began to grow as a distinct literary language from the western coastal dialect of
Middle Tamil and the linguistic separation completed sometime between the 9th and 13th centuries. The renowned poets of
Old Tamil such as
Paranar (1st century CE),
Ilango Adigal (2nd–3rd century CE), and Kulasekhara Alvar (9th century CE) were
Malayali.
The Sangam works can be considered as the ancient predecessor of Malayalam.
Some scholars however believe that both Tamil language and Malayalam developed during the prehistoric period from a common ancestor, "Proto-Tamil-Malayalam", and that the notion of Malayalam being a "daughter" of early middle Tamil language is misplaced. This is based on the fact that Malayalam and several Dravidian languages on the Western Coast have common archaic features which are not found even in the oldest historical forms of literary Tamil.[A. Govindankutty (1972) – From proto-Tamil-Malayalam to West Coast dialects. Indo-Iranian Journal, Vol. 14 No. (1/2), pp. 52–60] Despite this, Malayalam shares many common innovations with Tamil that emerged during the early Middle Tamil period, thus making independent descent untenable.
Indeed, most features of Malayalam morphology are derivable from a form of speech corresponding to early Middle Tamil.
Robert Caldwell, in his 1856 book " A Comparative Grammar of the Dravidian or South-Indian Family of Languages", opined that literary Malayalam branched from Classical Tamil and over time gained a large amount of Sanskrit vocabulary and lost the personal terminations of verbs.[Caldwell, Robert (1875). A Comparative Grammar of the Dravidian or South-Indian Family of Languages , second edition. London: Trübner & Co.] As the language of scholarship and administration, Old-Tamil, which was written in Tamil-Brahmi and the Vatteluttu alphabet later, greatly influenced the early development of Malayalam as a literary language. The Malayalam script began to diverge from the Vatteluttu and the Western Grantha script scripts in the 8th and 9th centuries of Common Era. By the end of the 13th century, a written form of the language emerged which was unique from the Vatteluttu script that was used to write Tamil on the eastern coast.
Old Malayalam
Old Malayalam (), an inscriptional language found in
Kerala from circa 9th to circa 13th century CE,
[M. G. S. Narayanan. "Kozhikkodinte Katha". Malayalam/Essays. Mathrubhumi Books. Second Edition (2017) ] is the earliest attested form of Malayalam.
The beginning of the development of
Old Malayalam from a western coastal dialect of
Middle Tamil can be dated to circa 8th century CE.
It remained a west coast dialect until circa 9th century CE or a little later.
The origin of Malayalam calendar dates back to year 825 CE.
It is generally agreed that the western coastal dialect of Tamil began to separate, diverge, and grow as a distinct language due to geographical separation of Kerala from the Tamil country
and the influence of
Sanskrit and
Prakrit from the
Nambudiri of the
Malabar Coast.
The Old Malayalam language was employed in several official records and transactions (at the level of the Chera Perumal kings, as well as the Caste (Nambudiri) village temples).
Middle Malayalam
Old Malayalam gradually developed into
Middle Malayalam (
Madhyakaala Malayalam) by the 13th century CE.
Malayalam literature also completely diverged from
Tamil literature during this period. Works including
Unniyachi Charitham,
Unnichiruthevi Charitham, and
Unniyadi Charitham, are written in
Middle Malayalam, and date back to the 13th and 14th centuries of the
Common Era.
The
Sandesha Kavyas of 14th century CE written in
Manipravalam language include
Unnuneeli Sandesam.
and
Kannassa Bharatham by
Rama Panikkar of the
Niranam poets who lived between 1350 and 1450, are representative of this language.
Ulloor has opined that Rama Panikkar holds the same position in Malayalam literature that
Edmund Spenser does in English literature.
The
Champu Kavyas written by Punam Nambudiri, one among the
Pathinettara Kavikal (Eighteen and a half poets) in the court of the Zamorin of Calicut, also belong to Middle Malayalam.
The literary works of this period were heavily influenced by
Manipravalam, which was a combination of contemporary
Tamil language and
Sanskrit.
The word
Mani-Pravalam literally means
Diamond-Coral or
Ruby-Coral. The 14th-century
Lilatilakam text states Manipravalam to be a
Bhashya (language) where "Dravida and Sanskrit should combine together like ruby and coral, without the least trace of any discord".
[Ke Rāmacandr̲an Nāyar (1971). Early Manipravalam: a study. Anjali. Foreign Language Study. pp. 78] The scripts of
Kolezhuthu and
Malayanma were also used to write
Middle Malayalam. In addition to
Vatteluthu and
Grantha script, those were used to write
Old Malayalam.
The literary works written in
Middle Malayalam were heavily influenced by
Sanskrit and
Prakrit, while comparing them with the modern Malayalam literature.
Modern Malayalam
The
Middle Malayalam was succeeded by Modern Malayalam (
Aadhunika Malayalam) by 15th century CE.
The poem
Krishnagatha written by Cherusseri Namboothiri, who was the court poet of the king Udaya Varman Kolathiri (1446–1475) of
Kolathunadu, is written in modern Malayalam.
The language used in
Krishnagatha is the modern spoken form of Malayalam.
During the 16th century CE, Thunchaththu Ezhuthachan from the Kingdom of Tanur and Poonthanam Nambudiri from the Kingdom of Valluvanad, followed the new trend initiated by Cherussery in their poems. The
Adhyathmaramayanam Kilippattu and
Mahabharatham Kilippattu, written by Ezhuthachan, and
Jnanappana, written by Poonthanam, are also included in the earliest form of Modern Malayalam.
Thunchaththu Ezhuthachan is also credited with developing the
Malayalam script into the current form through the intermixing and modification of the erstwhile scripts of
Vatteluttu,
Kolezhuthu, and
Grantha script, which were used to write the inscriptions and literary works of Old and Middle Malayalam.
He further eliminated excess and unnecessary letters from the modified script.
Hence, Ezhuthachan is also known as
The Father of modern Malayalam.
The development of modern
Malayalam script was also heavily influenced by the
Tigalari script, which was used to write
Sanskrit, due to the influence of
in Kerala.
The language used in the
Arabi Malayalam works of the 16th–17th century CE is a mixture of Modern Malayalam and
Arabic language.
They follow the syntax of modern Malayalam, though written in a modified form of
Arabic script, which is known as Arabi Malayalam script.
P. Shangunny Menon ascribes the authorship of the medieval work
Keralolpathi, which describes the
Parashurama legend and the departure of the final Cheraman Perumal king to
Mecca, to Thunchaththu Ramanujan Ezhuthachan.
[History of Travancore by Shungunny Menon, page 28]
Kunchan Nambiar introduced a new literary form called Thullal, and Unnayi Variyar introduced reforms in Kathakali.[ "Edasseri Govindan Nair" . Edasseri.org. Retrieved 7 March 2023.] Later, writers like O. V. Vijayan, Kamaladas, M. Mukundan, Arundhati Roy, and Vaikom Muhammed Basheer, have gained international recognition.
Dialects
Variations in intonation patterns, vocabulary, and distribution of grammatical and
phonology elements are observable along the parameters of region, religion, community, occupation, social stratum, style and register.
According to the Dravidian Encyclopedia, the regional of Malayalam can be divided into fifteen dialect areas.
According to Ethnologue, the dialects are:[[4] , censusindia.net]
The dialects of Malayalam spoken in the districts like Kasaragod, Kannur district, Wayanad, Kozhikode, and Malappuram in the former Malabar District have few influences from Kannada.
Labels such as "Nampoothiri Dialect", "Mappila Dialect", and "Nasrani Dialect" refer to overall patterns constituted by the sub-dialects spoken by the subcastes or sub-groups of each such caste. The most outstanding features of the major communal dialects of Malayalam are summarized below:
-
Lexical items with phonological features reminiscent of Sanskrit (e.g., meaning 'fool'), 'lie', 'impudence', 'impurity', and and (both meaning 'good-for-nothing fellow') abound in Nampoothiri dialect.
[ Malayalam (Namboodiri Dialect) – Cambridge University Press]
-
The Muslim dialect, also known as Arabi Malayalam, shows maximum divergence from the literary Standard Dialect of Malayalam. It is very much influenced by Arabic and Persian language rather than by Sanskrit or by English. The retroflex continuant of the literary dialect is realised in the Muslim dialect as the palatal . In some other dialects of Northern Kerala too, of the literary dialect is realised as .
-
The Syrian Christian or Nasrani dialect of Malayalam is quite close to the Nair dialect, especially in phonology. The speech of the educated section among Syrian Christians and that of those who are close to the church are peculiar in having a number of assimilated as well as unassimilated loan words from English language and Syriac language. The few loan words which have found their way into the Christian dialect are assimilated in many cases through the process of de-aspiration.
-
The Ravula language is a tribal dialect of Malayalam spoken by the members of Ravula, an indigenous people's tribe who are primarily inhabitants of the Kodagu district of Karnataka.
-
Tamil spoken in the Kanyakumari district has influences from Malayalam language.
External influences and loanwords
Malayalam has incorporated many elements from other languages over the years, the most notable of these being
Sanskrit and later, English. According to Sooranad Kunjan Pillai who compiled the authoritative Malayalam lexicon, the other principal languages whose vocabulary was incorporated over the ages were
Arabic,
Dutch language, Hindustani,
Pali,
Persian language, Portuguese,
Prakrit, and
Syriac language.
[S. Kunjan Pillai (1965) – Malayalam Lexicon, pg xxii–xxiv]
-
Many medieval liturgical texts were written in an admixture of Sanskrit and early Malayalam, called Manipravalam.
[ Manipravalam The Information & Public Relations Department, Government of Kerala.] The influence of Sanskrit was very prominent in formal Malayalam used in the medieval literature. Malayalam has a substantially high number of Sanskrit loanwords but these are seldom used.["Dravidian languages." Encyclopædia Britannica. Ultimate Reference Suite. Chicago: Encyclopædia Britannica, 2008.]
-
Some Arabic loanwords like adālattŭ (court of justice), jāmyaṃ (bail), japti (foreclosure), jilla (district), tālukkŭ (subdistrict), etc., are used in the formal literary Malayalam for administrative purposes.
-
Loanwords and influences also from Hebrew language, Syriac language, and Ladino language abound in the Judeo-Malayalam, as well as English language, Portuguese, Syriac language, and Greek language in the Christian dialects, while Arabic and Persian elements predominate in the Muslim dialects.
-
The Muslim dialect known as Mappila Malayalam is predominantly in the northern districts of Kerala. Another Muslim dialect called Beary bashe is used in the extreme northern part of Kerala along with the southern part of Karnataka in a former region called Tulu Nadu.
| +Examples of vocabulary from various origins
! scope="col"
! scope="col"
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Geographic distribution and population
Malayalam is a language spoken by the native people of southwestern India and the islands of
Lakshadweep in the
Arabian Sea. According to the Indian census of 2011, there were 32,413,213 speakers of Malayalam in Kerala, making up 93.2% of the total number of Malayalam speakers in India, and 97.03% of the total population of the state. There were a further 7,74,057 (2.22% of the total number) in
Karnataka, 7,26,096 (2.05%) in
Tamil Nadu, and 406,358 (1.2%) in
Maharashtra.
The number of Malayalam speakers in Lakshadweep is 51,100, which is only 0.15% of the total number, but is as much as about 84% of the population of Lakshadweep. Malayalam was the most spoken language in erstwhile Gudalur taluk (now Gudalur and Panthalur taluks) of Nilgiris district in Tamil Nadu which accounts for 48.8% population and it was the second most spoken language in Mangalore and Puttur taluks of South Canara accounting for 21.2% and 15.4% respectively according to 1951 census report.
In all, Malayalis made up 3.22% of the total Indian population in 2011. Of the total 34,713,130 Malayalam speakers in India in 2011, 33,015,420 spoke the standard dialects, 19,643 spoke the Yerava dialect and 31,329 spoke non-standard regional variations like Eranadan.
Just before independence, British Malaya attracted many Malayalis. Large numbers of Malayalis have settled in Chennai, Bengaluru, Mangaluru, Hyderabad, Mumbai, Navi Mumbai, Pune, Mysuru and Delhi. Many Malayalis have also emigrated to the Middle East, the United States, and Europe. There were 179,860 speakers of Malayalam in the United States, according to the 2000 census, with the highest concentrations in Bergen County, New Jersey, and Rockland County, New York.[[7] . Retrieved 22 November 2014.] There are 144,000 of Malayalam speakers in Malaysia. There were 11,687 Malayalam speakers in Australia in 2016.[ Statistics New Zealand:Language spoken (total responses) for the 1996–2006 censuses (Table 16), stats.govt.nz] 134 Malayalam speaking households were reported in 1956 in Fiji. There is also a considerable Malayali population in the Persian Gulf regions, especially in Dubai, Kuwait and Doha.
Phonology
For the consonants and vowels, the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) symbol is given, followed by the Malayalam character and the ISO 15919 transliteration.
The current Malayalam script bears high similarity with
Tigalari script, which was used for writing the
Tulu language, spoken in
Tulu Nadu (
Dakshina Kannada and
Udupi district districts) and the northernmost Kasargod district of Kerala.
Tigalari script was also used for writing
Sanskrit in
Malabar District.
Vowels
-
⟨ ്⟩ formed from word final short /u/'s but now there are /u/'s finally as well, mostly in loanwords but also natively like in , , and native , there are minimal pairs as well: "water", a given name; It is also added to the end of loanwords ending in some consonants, e.g. Sanskrit manas, suhr̥t, Malayalam , , English current Ml. . It is the , an epenthesis in Malayalam. Therefore, it has no independent vowel letter (because it never occurs at the beginning of words) but, when it comes after a consonant, there are various ways of representing it. In medieval times, it was just represented with the symbol for ⟨കു⟩, but later on it was just completely omitted (that is, written as an inherent vowel ⟨ക⟩, thus, ⟨പേര്⟩ "name" was once written as ⟨പേര⟩ which means "guava"). In modern times, it is written in two different ways – the Northern style, in which a chandrakkala is used ⟨ക്⟩, and the Southern or Travancore style, in which the diacritic for a is attached to the preceding consonant and a chandrakkala is written above ⟨കു്⟩. According to one author, this alternative form ⟨കു്⟩ is historically more correct, though the simplified form without a vowel sign u is common nowadays.
-
(phonetically central: ) is represented as basic or the "default" vowel in the abugida script.
Malayalam has also borrowed the Sanskrit diphthongs of (represented in Malayalam as ഐ, ai) and (represented in Malayalam as ഔ, au) although these mostly occur only in Sanskrit loanwords. Traditionally (as in Sanskrit), four vocalic consonants (usually pronounced in Malayalam as consonants followed by the , which is not officially a vowel, and not as actual vocalic consonants) have been classified as vowels: vocalic r (ഋ, , r̥), long vocalic r (ൠ, , r̥̄), vocalic l (ഌ, , l̥) and long vocalic l (ൡ, , l̥̄). Except for the first, the other three have been omitted from the current script used in Kerala as there are no words in current Malayalam that use them.
Some authors say that Malayalam has no diphthongs and are clusters of V+glide j/ʋ
Vowel length is phonemic and all of the vowels have minimal pairs; for example "thickness", "showed", "tapped", "twisted, stick, marble", "throw", "lots"
Some speakers also have from English loanwords; e.g. "bank" but most speakers replace it with or ; or and or .
Consonants
-
As in other Dravidian languages, the retroflex series are true subapical consonants, in which the underside of the tongue contacts the roof.
-
All of the alveolars except /s/ are apical.
-
/, , , , / can either be postalveolar or alveolo-palatal depending upon the speaker and dialect; the postalveolar and alveolo-palatal realizations are in free variation.
-
The alveolar nasal once had a separate character ⟨ഩ⟩ that is now obsolete and the sound is now almost always represented by the symbol that was originally used only for the dental nasal. However, both sounds are extensively used in current colloquial and official Malayalam, and although they were allophones in Old Malayalam, they now occasionally contrast in gemination – for example, ('by me', first person singular pronoun in the instrumental case) and ('if that is so'), which are both written (എന്നാൽ) and "eat!", "ate".
-
The unaspirated alveolar stop also had a separate character ⟨ഺ⟩ but it has become obsolete, as the sound only occurs in geminate form (when geminated it is written with a റ below another റ ⟨റ്റ⟩) or immediately following other consonants (in these cases, റ or ററ are usually written in small size underneath the first consonant).
-
The proto Dravidian alveolar stop *ṯ developed into an alveolar trill in many of the Dravidian languages and *ṉṯ became in Malayalam while *ṯṯ remained.
-
ന്റ is pronounced as but ൻറ can be pronounced as or ; doesn't occur natively but it occurs in loans like എൻറോൾ () 'enroll' or ഹെൻറി () 'Henry'.
[The Unicode Standard Version 13.0 – Core Specification, South and Central Asia-I, Official Scripts of India pg. 514]
-
All non geminated voiceless stops and affricate become voiced intervocalically and after a nasal as in Tamil.
-
The geminated velars and are sometimes palatalized word medially after like in the words കിടക്കുക vs ഇരിക്കുക and മങ്ങൽ vs. മത്തങ്ങ , their distribution is unpredictable e.g. it doesn't palatalize in but does in . If the palatalization is from it is sometimes deleted e.g. can be or , as or . Some of the northern dialects might pronounce them without palatalization.
-
The letter ഫ represents both , a phoneme occurring in Sanskrit loanwords, and , which is mostly found in comparatively recent borrowings from European languages. Though nowadays most people (especially youngsters) pronounce as like in the word ഫലം .
-
are unreleased word finally.
-
The plain stops, affricates, nasals, laterals, the fricatives and and approximants other than can be geminated and gemination can sometimes change the meaning of the word, e.g. 'cell', 'lie'.
-
The approximant has both rhotic and lateral qualities, and is indeterminate between an approximant and a fricative. The articulation of changes part-way through, perhaps explaining why it behaves as both a rhotic and a lateral, both an approximant and a fricative, but the nature of the change is not understood.
[Scobbie, Punnoose & Khattab (2013) "Articulating five liquids: a single speaker ultrasound study of Malayalam". In Rhotics: New Data and Perspectives. BU Press, Bozen-Bolzano.]
-
are weakly palatalized and have an advanced tongue root while are clear or velarized and have a retracted tongue root, particularly noticeable in geminates.
-
may be realized as or .
-
Around 75% of and 50% of and from Old Malayalam got assimilated to and , almost all of the merged with suggesting an earlier merger of some of the and (for e.g. the cognate of Tamil is spelt as and pronounced ); and were unchanged, e.g. Tamil , but Malayalam Word final became unless the word is monosyllabic, e.g. Tamil but Malayalam . Final in monosyllabic words became e.g. Tamil , but Malayalam .
-
Loanwords with are replaced with and not with like in Hindi or Telugu e.g. English "Brazil" unless it was loaned through Hindi then the Hindi pronunciation is taken e.g. Hi. Per. , other Perso-Arabic phonemes like are replaced with , sometimes are replaced with e.g. Arabic قطر , خَطّ became ഖത്തർ , കത്ത് . English loans with are replaced with ; the dentals do not clash with English loans with , which are replaced with or , though is rare because of the limited distribution natively e.g. "taxi" as or more commonly . The English is loaned as either or unpredictably, for e.g. 'current' got loaned as but 'maroon' got loaned as or but the cluster is loaned as other clusters are loaned as /rC/ or /ɾC/, only occurs in words with e.g. 'force' as . Speakers with non rhotic English accents don't have /ɹC/ clusters in English loans and pronounce it as . In Sanskrit, loans with /t̪C/ and /d̪C/ (unless C is a sonorant or a dental stop) sometimes the becomes especially in e.g. utsava > ulsavam, utpādana > ulpādaṉam, udghāṭana > ulghāḍaṉam.
-
Rarely, some speakers pronounce the voiced aspirated consonants as voiceless so words like as , it is more commonly deaspirated so as and as , intervocalically the voiceless aspirate also becomes voiced so as .
Colloquial language
Source:
-
, gets lowered to when before Ca, eg. > , this change is seen in 10th century inscriptions, instead of .
-
Medial 's maybe pronounced as a in the north and center, in central it may even merge with a for some, eg. > , > , > . In center and north, can become when there is a non back vowel preceding it, eg. , , > , , . This change is also seen in the standard form.
-
Sporadic cases of > , eg. > , but not in or .
-
Cases of > , most commonly in the north and in some castelects, ef. > .
-
A general feature is that the overall length of vowels decrease further north you go.
-
In fast speech initial consonants may be dropped, eg. > > > > > > > > .
-
dropped in coda, eg. (>), > . Northern and Southern dialects might hypercorrect the last and similar words to . Word finally it happens only if the next word starts with a consonant.
-
Medial maybe lenited to a fricative or completely lost in center and north, eg. > SK. , NK. CK. ; > CK. .
-
merged with in certain Mappila and castelects.
-
More cases of nasal assimilation, eg. > . In some dialects > .
-
Loss of aspiration.
-
> , sometimes too, eg. > .
-
Merger of with farther north and sporadically in center, particularly among Mappila speech, e.g. > . In some areas like Malappuram it's merged with instead, so > .
Sample text
The following text is Article 1 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
English
All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.
Malayalam
മനുഷ്യരെല്ലാവരും തുല്യാവകാശങ്ങളോടും അന്തസ്സോടും സ്വാതന്ത്ര്യത്തോടുംകൂടി ജനിച്ചിട്ടുള്ളവരാണ്. അന്യോന്യം ഭ്രാതൃഭാവത്തോടെ പെരുമാറുവാനാണ് മനുഷ്യന് വിവേകബുദ്ധിയും മനസാക്ഷിയും സിദ്ധമായിരിക്കുന്നത്.
Romanisation (ISO 15919)
manuṣyarellāvaruṁ tulyāvakāśaṅṅaḷōṭuṁ antassōṭuṁ svātantryattōṭuṅkūṭi janicciṭṭuḷḷavarāṇŭ. anyōnyaṁ bhrātr̥bhāvattōṭe perumāṟuvānāṇŭ manuṣyanŭ vivēkabuddhiyuṁ manasākṣiyuṁ siddhamāyirikkunnatŭ.
IPA
/manuʂjaɾellaːʋaɾum t̪uljaːʋakaːʃaŋŋaɭoːʈum an̪t̪assoːʈum sʋaːt̪an̪tɾjat̪t̪oːʈuŋkuːʈi d͡ʒanit͡ʃt͡ʃiʈʈuɭɭaʋaɾaːɳɨ̆ ǁ anjoːnjam bʱraːt̪rɨ̆bʱaːʋat̪t̪oːʈe peɾumaːruʋaːnaːɳɨ̆ manuʂjanɨ̆ ʋiʋeːkabud̪d̪ʱijum manasaːkʂijum sid̪d̪ʱamaːjiɾikkun̪ːat̪ɨ̆ ǁ/
Grammar
Malayalam has a canonical word order of SOV (subject–object–verb), as do other Dravidian languages.
A rare OSV word order occurs in interrogative clauses when the interrogative word is the subject.
Both
and possessive adjectives precede the
they modify. Malayalam has 6
[Asher, R. E. and Kumari, T. C. (1997). Malayalam. Routledge Pub.: London.] or 7
. Verbs are conjugated for tense, mood and aspect, but not for person, gender nor number except in archaic or poetic language. The modern Malayalam grammar is based on the book
Kerala Panineeyam written by A. R. Raja Raja Varma in late 19th century CE.
Nouns
The
paradigms for some common nouns and pronouns are given below. As Malayalam is an agglutinative language, it is difficult to delineate the cases strictly and determine how many there are, although seven or eight is the generally accepted number.
and
Alveolar nasal (although the modern
Malayalam script does not distinguish the latter from the
dental nasal) are underlined for clarity, following the convention of the National Library at Kolkata romanization.
Personal pronouns
Vocative case forms are given in parentheses after the
nominative, as the only pronominal vocatives that are used are the third person ones, which only occur in compounds.
Other nouns
The following are examples of some of the most common declension patterns.
Words adopted from Sanskrit
When words are adopted from Sanskrit, their endings are usually changed to conform to Malayalam norms:
Nouns
-
Masculine Sanskrit nouns with a word stem ending in a short /a/ take the ending /an/ in the nominative singular. For example, Krishna → Kr̥ṣṇan. The final /n/ is dropped before masculine surnames, honorifics, or titles ending in /an/ and beginning with a consonant other than /n/ – e.g., "Krishna Menon", "Krishna Kaniyaan" etc., but "Krishnan Ezhutthachan". Surnames ending with /ar/ or /aḷ/ (where these are plural forms of "an" denoting respect) are treated similarly – "Krishna Pothuval", "Krishna Chakyar", but "Krishnan Nair", "Krishnan Nambiar", as are Sanskrit surnames such "Varma(n)", "Sharma(n)", or "Gupta(n)" (rare) – e.g., "Krishna Varma", "Krishna Sharman". If a name is a compound, only the last element undergoes this transformation – e.g., "Kr̥ṣṇa" + "dēva" = "Kr̥ṣṇadēvan", not "Kr̥ṣṇandēvan".
-
Feminine words ending in a long /ā/ or /ī/ are changed to end in a short /a/ or /i/, for example "Sita" → "Sīta" and "Lakshmi" → "Lakṣmi". However, the long vowel still appears in compound words, such as "Sītādēvi" or" Lakṣmīdēvi". The long ī is generally reserved for the vocative case forms of these names, although in Sanskrit the vocative actually takes a short /i/. There are also a small number of nominative /ī/ endings that have not been shortened – a prominent example being the word "strī" for "woman".
-
Nouns that have a stem in /-an/ and which end with a long /ā/ in the masculine nominative singular have /vŭ/ added to them, for example "Brahmā" (stem "Brahman") → "Brahmāvŭ". When the same nouns are declined in the neuter and take a short /a/ ending in Sanskrit, Malayalam adds an additional /m/, e.g. "Brahma" (neuter nominative singular of "Brahman") becomes "Brahmam". This is again omitted when forming compounds.
-
Words whose roots end in /-an/ but whose nominative singular ending is /-a-/ (for example, the Sanskrit root of "karma" is actually "karman") are also changed. The original root is ignored and "karma" (the form in Malayalam being "karmam" because it ends in a short /a/) is taken as the basic form of the noun when declining.
-
Sanskrit words describing things or animals rather than people with a stem in short /a/ end with an /m/ in Malayalam. For example, "Ramayana" → "Rāmāyaṇam". In most cases, this is actually the same as the Sanskrit accusative case ending, which is also /m/ (or, allophonically, anusvara due to the requirements of the sandhi word-combining rules) in the neuter nominative. However, "things and animals" and "people" are not always differentiated based on whether or not they are sentient beings; for example, "Narasimha" becomes "Narasiṃham" and not "Narasiṃhan", whereas "Ananta Shesha" becomes "Anantan" even though both are sentient. This does not strictly correspond to the Sanskrit neuter gender, as both "Narasiṃha" and "Ananta" are masculine nouns in the original Sanskrit.
-
Nouns with short vowel stems other than /a/, such as "Vishnu", "Prajapati" etc. are declined with the Sanskrit stem acting as the Malayalam nominative singular (the Sanskrit nominative singular is formed by adding a visarga, e.g., as in "Viṣṇuḥ")
-
The original Sanskrit vocative is often used in formal or poetic Malayalam, e.g. "Harē" (for "Hari") or "Prabhō" (for "Prabhu" – "Lord"). This is restricted to certain contexts – mainly when addressing deities or other exalted individuals, so a normal man named Hari would usually be addressed using a Malayalam vocative such as "Harī". The Sanskrit genitive is also occasionally found in Malayalam poetry, especially the personal pronouns "mama" ("my" or "mine") and "tava" ("thy" or "thine"). Other cases are less common and generally restricted to the realm of Maṇipravāḷam.
-
Along with these tatsama borrowings, there are also many tadbhava words in common use. These were incorporated via borrowing before the separation of Malayalam and Tamil. As the language did not then accommodate Sanskrit phonology as it now does, words were changed to conform to the Old Tamil phonological system, for example "Kr̥ṣṇa" → "Kaṇṇan".
Writing system
Aside from the Malayalam script, the Malayalam language has been written in other scripts like
Latin script, Syriac
[ Suriyani Malayalam , Nasrani Foundation][ A sacred language is vanishing from State , The Hindu][ Prayer from the Past , India Today] and
Arabi Malayalam. Suriyani Malayalam was used by Saint Thomas Christians (also known as Nasranis) until the 19th century.
Arabic scripts particularly were taught in
in Kerala and the Lakshadweep Islands.
Malayalam script
Historically, several scripts were used to write Malayalam. Among these were the Vatteluttu,
Kolezhuthu and
Malayanma scripts. But it was the
Grantha script, another
Southern Brahmi variation, which gave rise to the modern
Malayalam script. The modern Malayalam script bears high similarity to
Tigalari script, which was used for writing
Tulu language in
South Canara (
Dakshina Kannada and
Udupi district districts) and the northernmost Kasaragod district of Kerala.
It is syllabic in the sense that the sequence of graphic elements means that syllables have to be read as units, though in this system the elements representing individual vowels and consonants are for the most part readily identifiable. In the 1960s Malayalam dispensed with many special letters representing less frequent conjunct consonants and combinations of the vowel /u, u:/ with different consonants.
Malayalam script consists of a total of 578 characters. The script contains 52 letters including 16 vowels and 36 consonants, which forms 576 syllabic characters, and contains two additional diacritic characters named anusvāra and visarga.
In 1999 a group named "Rachana Akshara Vedi" produced a set of free typeface containing the entire character repertoire of more than 900 . This was announced and released along with a text editor in the same year at Thiruvananthapuram, the capital of Kerala. In 2004, the fonts were released under the GPL license by Richard Stallman of the Free Software Foundation at the Cochin University of Science and Technology in Kochi, Kerala.
Chillu letters
A
chillu (ചില്ല്, ), or a
chillaksharam (ചില്ലക്ഷരം, ), is a special consonant letter that represents a pure consonant independently, without help of a
virama. Unlike a consonant represented by an ordinary consonant letter, this consonant is never followed by an inherent vowel. Anusvara and visarga fit this definition but are not usually included. ISCII and Unicode 5.0 treat a
chillu as a glyph variant of a normal ("base") consonant letter.
In Unicode 5.1 and later,
chillu letters are treated as independent characters, encoded atomically.
| + Chillu letters
! scope="col" | Letter
! scope="col" | Unicode name
! scope="col" | Base
! scope="col" | Remarks
! scope="col" | Examples |
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Number system and other symbols
Numerals
Malayalam numbers and fractions are written as follows. These are archaic and no longer used. Instead, the common Hindu-Arabic numeral system is followed. There is a confusion about the glyph of Malayalam digit zero. The correct form is oval-shaped, but occasionally the glyph for (൳) is erroneously shown as the glyph for 0.
Number "11" is written as "൰൧" and not "൧൧". "32" is written as "൩൰൨" similar to the Tamil numerals.
For example, the number "2013" is read in Malayalam as രണ്ടായിരത്തി പതിമൂന്ന് (). It is split into:
-
രണ്ട് () : 2 – ൨
-
ആയിരം () : 1000 – ൲
-
പത്ത് () : 10 – ൰
-
മൂന്ന് () : 3 – ൩
Combine them together to get the Malayalam number ൨൲൰൩.
And 1,00,000 as "൱൲" = hundred(൱), thousand(൲) (100×1000), 10,00,000 as "൰൱൲" = ten(൰), hundred(൱), thousand(൲) (10×100×1000) and 1,00,00,000 as "൱൱൲" = hundred(൱), hundred(൱), thousand(൲) (100×100×1000).
Later on this system got reformed to be more similar to the Hindu-Arabic numerals so 10,00,000 in the reformed numerals it would be ൧൦൦൦൦൦൦.
Fractions
In Malayalam you can transcribe any fraction by affixing () after the denominator followed by the numerator, so a fraction like would be read as
പത്തിൽ ഏഴ് () 'out of ten, seven' but fractions like and have distinct names (, , ) and () 'half quarter'.
Vattezhuthu alphabet
Vatteluttu (, "round writing") is a script that had evolved from
Tamil-Brahmi and was once used extensively in the southern part of present-day
Tamil Nadu and in
Kerala.
Malayalam was first written in Vattezhuthu. The Vazhappally inscription issued by Rajashekhara Varman is the earliest example, dating from about 830 CE.[Burnell (1874), p. 39.] or the 18th century.
Vatteluttu was in general use, but was not suitable for literature where many Sanskrit words were used. Like Tamil-Brahmi, it was originally used to write Tamil language, and as such, did not have letters for voiced or aspirated consonants used in Sanskrit but not used in Tamil. For this reason, Vatteluttu and the Grantha alphabet were sometimes mixed, as in the Manipravalam. One of the oldest examples of the Manipravalam literature, Vaishikatantram (വൈശികതന്ത്രം, Vaiśikatantram), dates back to the 12th century,[Nampoothiri, N. M. (1999), "Cultural Traditions in Medieval Kerala" (PDF) in Cherian, P. J., Perspectives on Kerala History: The Second Millennium, Kerala Council for Historical Research, , retrieved 2009-11-20.]
Another variant form, Malayanma, was used in the south of Thiruvananthapuram.[Andronov, Mikhail Sergeevich. A Grammar of the Malayalam Language in Historical Treatment. Wiesbaden : Harrassowitz, 1996.]
Grantha
According to Arthur Coke Burnell, one form of the Grantha alphabet, originally used in the
Chola dynasty, was imported into the southwest coast of India in the 8th or 9th century, which was then modified in course of time in this secluded area, where communication with the east coast was very limited.
[Burnell (1874), p. 35.] It later evolved into Tigalari-Malayalam script was used by the
Malayali, Havyaka Brahmins and Tulu Brahmin people, but was originally only applied to write
Sanskrit. This script split into two scripts: Tigalari and Malayalam. While Malayalam script was extended and modified to write vernacular language Malayalam, the Tigalari was written for Sanskrit only.
In Malabar, this writing system was termed Arya-eluttu (ആര്യ എഴുത്ത്,
Ārya eḻuttŭ),
meaning "Arya writing" (Sanskrit is Indo-Aryan language while Malayalam is a Dravidian language).
Karshoni
Suriyani Malayalam (സുറിയാനി മലയാളം, ܣܘܪܝܢܝ ܡܠܝܠܡ), also known as
Karshoni,
Syro-Malabarica or
Syriac Malayalam, is a version of Malayalam written in a variant form of the
Syriac alphabet which was popular among the Saint Thomas Christians (also known as Syrian Christians or Nasranis) of
Kerala in
India.
It uses Malayalam grammar, the
Madnhaya or "Eastern" Syriac script with special
orthography features, and vocabulary from Malayalam and East Syriac. This originated in the South Indian region of the
Malabar Coast (modern-day Kerala). Until the 20th century, the script was widely used by Syrian Christians in Kerala.
Ponnani script
The Arabi Malayalam script, otherwise known as the
Ponnani script,
is a writing system – a variant form of the
Arabic script with special
orthography features – which was developed during the early medieval period and used to write
Arabi Malayalam until the early 20th century CE.
[Miller, Roland. E., "Mappila" in "The Encyclopedia of Islam". Volume VI. E. J. Brill, Leiden. 1987. pp. 458–56.] Though the script originated and developed in
Kerala, today it is predominantly used in
Malaysia and
Singapore by the migrant
Muslim community.
[Menon. T. Madhava. "A Handbook of Kerala, Volume 2", International School of Dravidian Linguistics, 2002. pp. 491–493.]
Literature
The Sangam literature can be considered as the ancient predecessor of Malayalam.
According to Iravatham Mahadevan, the earliest Malayalam inscription discovered until now is the Edakal-5 inscription (ca. late 4th century – early 5th century) reading ( 'this is old').
Although this has been disputed by many scholars who regard it as a regional dialect of Old Tamil.
The use of the pronoun and the lack of the literary Tamil ending are archaisms from Proto-Dravidian rather than unique innovations of Malayalam.
The early literature of Malayalam comprised three types of composition:
-
Classical songs known as Nadan Pattu
-
Manipravalam of the Sanskrit tradition, which permitted a generous interspersing of Sanskrit with Malayalam. Niranam poets
-
The folk song rich in native elements
Malayalam literature has been profoundly influenced by poets Cherusseri Namboothiri,
Thunchaththu Ezhuthachan,
and Poonthanam Nambudiri,
in the 15th and the 16th centuries of Common Era.
[Freeman, Rich (2003). "Genre and Society: The Literary Culture of Premodern Kerala". In Literary Cultures in History: Reconstructions from South Asia] Unnayi Variyar, a probable 17th–18th century poet,
and
Kunchan Nambiar, a poet of 18th century,
also greatly influenced Malayalam literature in its early form.
The words used in many of the
Arabi Malayalam works those date back to 16th–17th centuries of
Common Era are also very closer to the modern Malayalam language.
The prose literature, criticism, and Malayalam journalism began after the latter half of 18th century CE. Contemporary Malayalam literature deals with social, political, and economic life context. The tendency of the modern poetry is often towards political radicalism.
Malayalam literature has been presented with six
Jnanpith Award, the second-most for any Dravidian language and the third-highest for any Indian language.
Malayalam poetry to the late 20th century betrays varying degrees of the fusion of the three different strands. The oldest examples of Pattu and Manipravalam, respectively, are Ramacharitam and Vaishikatantram, both from the 12th century.
The earliest extant prose work in the language is a commentary in simple Malayalam, Bhashakautalyam (12th century) on Chanakya's Arthashastra. Adhyatmaramayanam by Thunchaththu Ramanujan Ezhuthachan (known as the father of modern Malayalam literature) who was born in Tirur, one of the most important works in Malayalam literature. Unnunili Sandesam written in the 14th century is amongst the oldest literary works in Malayalam language.
By the end of the 18th century some of the Christian missionaries from Kerala started writing in Malayalam but mostly travelogues, dictionaries and religious books. Varthamanappusthakam (1778), written by Paremmakkal Thoma Kathanar
Folk Songs
For the first 600 years of the Malayalam calendar, Malayalam literature remained in a preliminary stage. During this time, Malayalam literature consisted mainly of various genres of songs (
Pattu).
Folk songs are the oldest literary form in Malayalam.
They were just oral songs.
Many of them were related to agricultural activities, including
Pulayar Pattu,
Pulluvan Pattu,
Njattu Pattu,
Koythu Pattu, etc.
Other
of Folk Song period include the
Vadakkan Pattukal (Northern songs) in
North Malabar region and the
Thekkan Pattukal (Southern songs) in Southern Travancore.
Some of the earliest
(Muslim songs) were also folk songs.
Old and Middle Malayalam
The earliest known poems in Malayalam,
Ramacharitam and
Thirunizhalmala, dated to the 12th to 14th century, were completed before the introduction of the Sanskrit alphabet. It was written by a poet with the pen name
Cheeramakavi who, according to poet Ulloor S Parameswara Iyer, was Sree Veerarama Varman, a king of southern Kerala from AD 1195 to 1208.
However the claim that it was written in Southern Kerala is expired on the basis of new discoveries.
Other experts, like Chirakkal T Balakrishnan Nair, K.M. George, M. M. Purushothaman Nair, and P.V. Krishnan Nair, state that the origin of the book is in Kasaragod district in
North Malabar region.
They cite the use of certain words in the book and also the fact that the manuscript of the book was recovered from
Nileshwaram in
North Malabar.
The influence of
Ramacharitam is mostly seen in the contemporary literary works of Northern Kerala.
The words used in
Ramacharitam such as
Nade (
Mumbe),
Innum (
Iniyum),
Ninna (
Ninne), Chaaduka (
Eriyuka) are special features of the dialect spoken in
North Malabar (
Kasaragod-
Kannur region).
Furthermore, the Thiruvananthapuram mentioned in
Ramacharitham is not the Thiruvananthapuram in Southern Kerala.
But it is Ananthapura Lake Temple of
Kumbla in the northernmost Kasaragod district of Kerala.
The word
Thiru is used just by the meaning
Honoured.
Today it is widely accepted that
Ramacharitham was written somewhere in
North Malabar (most likely near
Kasaragod).
But the period of the earliest available literary document cannot be the sole criterion used to determine the antiquity of a language. In its early literature, Malayalam has songs, Pattu, for various subjects and occasions, such as harvesting, love songs, heroes, gods, etc. A form of writing called Campu emerged from the 14th century onwards. It mixed poetry with prose and used a vocabulary strongly influenced by Sanskrit, with themes from epics and Puranas.
The works including Unniyachi Charitham, Unnichirudevi Charitham, and Unniyadi Charitham, are written in Middle Malayalam, those date back to 13th and 14th centuries of Common Era.
Modern Malayalam
The poem
Krishnagatha written by Cherusseri Namboothiri, who was the court poet of the king Udaya Varman Kolathiri (1446–1475) of
Kolathunadu, is written in modern Malayalam.
The language used in
Krishnagatha is the modern spoken form of Malayalam.
It appears to be the first literary work written in the present-day language of Malayalam.
During the 16th century CE, Thunchaththu Ezhuthachan from the Kingdom of Tanur and Poonthanam Nambudiri from the Kingdom of Valluvanad followed the new trend initiated by Cherussery in their poems. The
Adhyathmaramayanam Kilippattu and
Mahabharatham Kilippattu written by Ezhuthachan and
Jnanappana written by Poonthanam are also included in the earliest form of Modern Malayalam.
The words used in most of the
Arabi Malayalam works, which dates back to 16th–17th centuries, are also very closer to modern Malayalam language.
P. Shangunny Menon ascribes the authorship of the medieval work
Keralolpathi, which describes the
Parashurama legend and the departure of the final Cheraman Perumal king to
Mecca, to Thunchaththu Ramanujan Ezhuthachan.
Kunchan Nambiar, the founder of Thullal movement, was a prolific literary figure of the 18th century.
Impact of European scholars
The British printed Malabar English Dictionary
by Graham Shaw in 1779 was still in the form of a Tamil-English Dictionary.
Paremmakkal Thoma Kathanar wrote the first Malayalam travelogue called
Varthamanappusthakam in 1789.
Hermann Gundert, (1814–1893), a German missionary and scholar of exceptional linguistic talents, played a distinguishable role in the development of Malayalam literature. His major works are Keralolpathi (1843), Pazhancholmala (1845), Malayalabhaasha Vyakaranam (1851), Paathamala (1860) the first Malayalam school text book, Kerala pazhama (1868), the first Malayalam dictionary (1872), Malayalarajyam (1879) – Geography of Kerala, Rajya Samacharam (1847 June) the first Malayalam news paper, Paschimodayam (1879) – Magazine.[ Rajyasamacharam | Kerala Press Academy . Pressacademy.org. Retrieved 28 July 2013.] He lived in Thalassery for around 20 years. He learned the language from well established local teachers Ooracheri Gurukkanmar from Chokli, a village near Thalassery and consulted them in works. He also translated the Bible into Malayalam.[ Herman Gundert | Kerala Press Academy . Pressacademy.org. Retrieved 28 July 2013.]
In 1821, the Church Mission Society (CMS) at Kottayam in association with the Syriac Orthodox Church started a seminary at Kottayam in 1819 and started printing books in Malayalam when Benjamin Bailey, an Anglican priest, made the first Malayalam types. In addition, he contributed to standardizing the prose.[ "Banjamin Bailey" , The Hindu, 5 February 2010] Hermann Gundert from Stuttgart, Germany, started the first Malayalam newspaper, Rajya Samacaram in 1847 at Thalassery. It was printed at Basel Mission.[
]
target="_blank" rel="nofollow"> Rajya Samacaram, "1847 first Newspaper in Malayalam", Kerala Government Malayalam and Sanskrit were increasingly studied by Christians of Kottayam and Pathanamthitta. The Marthomite movement in the mid-19th century called for replacement of Syriac language by Malayalam for liturgical purposes. By the end of the 19th century Malayalam replaced Syriac language as language of Liturgy in all Syrian Christian churches.
1850–1904
Vengayil Kunhiraman Nayanar, (1861–1914) from
Thalassery was the author of first Malayalam short story, Vasanavikriti. After him innumerable world class literature works by was born in Malayalam.
O. Chandu Menon wrote his novels "Indulekha" and "Saradha" while he was the judge at Parappanangadi Munciff Court. Indulekha is also the first Major Novel written in Malayalam language.
. The poetry was translated by Kerala Varma as Abhijnanasakuntalam]].
The third quarter of the 19th century CE bore witness to the rise of a new school of poets devoted to the observation of life around them and the use of pure Malayalam. The major poets of the Venmani School were Venmani Achhan Nambudiripad (1817–1891), Venmani Mahan Nambudiripad (1844–1893), Poonthottam Achhan Nambudiri (1821–1865), Poonthottam Mahan Nambudiri (1857–1896) and the members of the Kodungallur Kovilakam (Royal Family) such as Kodungallur Kunjikkuttan Thampuran. The style of these poets became quite popular for a while and influenced even others who were not members of the group like Velutheri Kesavan Vaidyar (1839–1897) and Perunlli Krishnan Vaidyan (1863–1894). The Venmani school pioneered a style of poetry that was associated with common day themes, and the use of pure Malayalam ( Pachcha Malayalam) rather than Sanskrit.
Twentieth century
In the second half of the 20th century,
Jnanpith winning poets and writers like G. Sankara Kurup, S. K. Pottekkatt, Thakazhi Sivasankara Pillai, M. T. Vasudevan Nair, O. N. V. Kurup, Edasseri Govindan Nair and Akkitham Achuthan Namboothiri, had made valuable contributions to the modern Malayalam literature.
Later, writers like O. V. Vijayan,
Kamaladas, M. Mukundan,
Arundhati Roy, and Vaikom Muhammed Basheer, have gained international recognition.
Prose
The travelogues written by S. K. Pottekkatt were turning point in the travelogue literature.
The writers like Kavalam Narayana Panicker have contributed much to Malayalam drama.
Thakazhi Sivasankara Pillai turned away from party politics and produced a moving romance in Chemmeen (Shrimps) in 1956. For S. K. Pottekkatt and Vaikom Muhammad Basheer, who had not dabbled in politics, the continuity is marked in the former's Vishakanyaka (Poison Maid, 1948) and the latter's Ntuppuppakkoranendarnnu (My Grandpa had an Elephant, 1951). The non-political social or domestic novel was championed by Uroob with his Ummachu (1955) and Sundarikalum Sundaranmarum (Men and Women of Charm, 1958).
In 1957 Basheer's Pathummayude Aadu (Pathumma's Goat) brought in a new kind of prose tale, which perhaps only Basheer could handle with dexterity. The fifties thus mark the evolution of a new kind of fiction, which had its impact on the short stories as well. This was the auspicious moment for the entry of M. T. Vasudevan Nair and T. Padmanabhan upon the scene. Front runners in the post-modern trend include Kakkanadan, O. V. Vijayan, E. Harikumar, M. Mukundan and Anand.
Kerala has the highest media exposure in India with newspapers publishing in nine languages, mainly English language and Malayalam.
Poetry
Contemporary Malayalam poetry deals with social, political, and economic life context. The tendency of the modern poetry is often towards political radicalism.
See also
Sources
-
-
-
-
Govindankutty, A. "From Proto-Tamil-Malayalam to West Coast Dialects", 1972. Indo-Iranian Journal, Vol. XIV, Nr. 1/2, pp. 52–60.
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Further reading
- English
- Malayalam
Notes
External links
