Excerpt from 'Cultural and Linguistic Consciousness
of the Tamil Community' by K. Kailaspathy.
In his own lifetime Prof. Kailaspathy's work both inspired
and provoked a robust debate, particularly amongst radical scholars
working on Tamil literature, culture and ideology. Today we republish
this excerpt from his writings not to intervene in those debates
but because it speaks to current debates regarding the mobilization
of claims to Tamil culture through events such as Pongu Thamil.
Prof. Kailaspathy and his critics, through the very vigor of their
debates, spoke of Tamil culture as a contested terrain; they brought
a critical consciousness and an analysis of power and social cleavage
to scrutinize the politics behind claims to represent Tamil cultural
authenticity.
Sociologically speaking the linguistic and cultural awakening
described above, was essentially that of the middle-class Tamils
with the upper middle-class providing the leadership. The awakening
which began in the religious sphere extended to the linguistic
and literary fields. Basically it was a form of cultural self-assertion
in the face of colonial domination. The point is that this cultural
consciousness was limited in scope and in effect, designed to
buttress the middle-class values and aspirations and also provide
that class with the necessary image for leadership. In concrete
terms, the cultural activities were confined to a few conspicuous
areas: being backward looking in its orientation, the middle-class
sought to revive and cultivate certain features of Tamil culture
that had become part of the established order in the old society.
In so far as language was concerned, the zeal for Sen-Tamil, "Cultured
Tamil" or "Classical Tamil" which for all practical
purposes was moribund, (although Sir P. Ramanathan and his son-in-law
and political successor S. Natesan create a vogue for speaking
in the classical style), was the basis for the founding of societies
and the holding of conferences. Bharata Natyam and Carnatic Music
were the two forms that came to be considered the necessary artistic
acquirements for a cultured Tamil girl. Both were extolled as
"Tamilian arts and achievements" and soon became the
preoccupation of middle-class Tamils. Bharata Natyam in particular
had been resuscitated in the early twenties by the efforts of
people like Bharata Iyer, Rukmani Arundale (who founded the Kalakshtra,
which has remained the outstanding Dance Academy in Madras) and
G. Venkatachalam whose critical essays helped propagate the tradition
and ideals of that dance form. During the 18th and 19th centuries,
Bharata Natyam had become degraded, and called "nautch-dance",
performed by courtesans and prostitutes. While scholars and critics
from G. Venkatachalam to the late Professor V. Raghavan contributed
immensely to the resurgence of Bharata Natyam, it was perhaps,
in the writings of Ananda Coomaraswamy that the dance form found
its greatest champion. Two of the earliest monographs of Coomaraswamy
were The Mirror of Gesture (1917) and The Dance of Shiva (1918)
both of which have inspired almost all subsequent writers on Bharata
Natyam. Likewise Carnatic music had been brought from the court
and temple to the concert hall and along with the dance form,
acclaimed as divine arts. Thus we see that Tamil language, Bharata
Natyam and Carnatic music were deified and thereby denied the
possibility of experimentation and innovation. It goes without
saying that considerable affluence was the precondition for the
cultivation of these arts and it was the upper classes that could
afford them. As a result, popular arts suffered and became even
more debased and deprived of support. It is therefore not surprising
that until the late 1950s and early 1960s there was hardly any
significant movement for studying and cherishing the popular arts
or what is often described as 'folkarts'. This lack of interest
in folk literature and arts was no doubt a reflection of the intrinsic
class bias of the patrons of art and culture. Needless to say
the "ancient and divine arts" were carefully guarded
against any political intrusions, especially of any ideas tinged
with social reform or change. To put it differently, artistic
forms which are periodically revitalized by the absorbtion of
radical ideas and giving expression to them, were kept hermetically
sealed by the upper middle-class purely as status symbols and
ethnic identity characteristics.
This was the nature of the linguistic and cultural consciousness
of the Tamils until the 1950s. The most sensitive Tamil scholars
and creative writers like the late A. Periyathambi Pillai (1899
- 1978) S. Somasundra Pulavar (1878 - 1953) N. Nallathambipulavar
(1896 - 1951) and Thuraiappa Pillai always conceived Sinhala and
Tamil as two eyes or two sisters or two companions and sang of
a united happy home.
Post-independent political developments began to change this
picture. The disfranchisement of about 900,000 of Tamils of Indian
origin and the constant increase of Sinhalese seats in successive
parliamentary elections and other events increased the awareness
of the Tamils as a national minority. It is not fortuitous that
in 1952, the Tamil Cultural Society was formed in Colombo. Its
programme included not only the propagation of the history and
culture of the Tamils in Sri Lanka, but also in the other parts
of the world.
Some aspects of the cultural consciousness at this period merit
attention. Although South India continued to be looked upon as
the 'mainland', it was nevertheless gradually receding into the
background. The past and present history of the Tamils in Sri
Lanka was unavoidably becoming increasingly important and experientially
immediate. Whatever common links and bonds there were between
the Tamils in Sir Lanka and South India, the two peoples were
living under different governments and facing different problems.
The dialectal differences too were becoming more evident. Thus
for the first time, Sri Lanka, Sri Lanka Tamils began to manifest
a keen interest in this land. No doubt the interest was mostly
from the Tamil point of view. Questions such as when and from
where did the Tamils come here? Are they autochthonous to the
land? What is their relationship to the Sinhala people? What is
their contribution to the culture and civilization of this country?
These and other questions protruded to the forefront in ever increasing
frequency and intensity. It is true that in the preceding decades
Mudaliyar C. Rasanayagam (1870 - 1940), Fr. Gnanapiragasar, A.
Muthuthamby, K. Velupillai (1860 - 1944) and others had shown
interest in the history of the Tamils. Their attempts were basically
academic in character. But in the fifties, the historical writings
were more than academic. There was an urgency and involvement
in the quests. Professor K. Kanapathi Pillai (1903 - 1968) published
his historical play Sankili (1956) which he prefaced with a "history
of Tamils in Sri Lanka." This was followed by C. S. Navaratnam's
Tamils and Ceylon (1958), and K. Navaratnam's Tamil Element in
Ceylon Culture (1959). Nor was the interest confined to history.
K. Navaratnam (1898 - 1962) who was a devotee of Ananda Coomaraswamy
and had popularized some of his books in Tamil, brought out in
Tamil the Development of Arts in Sri Lanka (1954). This trend
continued to grow with the voices becoming more shrill and the
tone overtly polemical. Some of the academic writings of this
period found an outlet in the journal Tamil Culture (1952 - 1966)
which was being edited by a Sri Lankan Xavier S. Thani Nayagam.
It was printed and published in Madras. It carried academic articles
like A. J. Wilson's " Cultural and Language Rights in the
Multinational Society" (1953), Thani Nayagam's "Tamil
Culture - its past, its present and its future with special reference
to Ceylon" (1955) and also amateurish pieces like W. Balendra's
"Trincomali Bronzes" (1953) and S. J. Gunasegaram's
"Early Tamil Cultural Influences in South - East Asia"
(1957). H. W. Tambiah published his The Laws and Customs of the
Tamils of Ceylon (1954) probably responding to the prevalent mood.
A recent contribution to the subject is Tamil Culture in Ceylon
by M. D. Raghavan. Generally speaking, the concept of Tamil culture
was given a wider significance and interpretation. C. Sivaratnam's
The Tamils in Early Ceylon (1964) reflects this tendency. There
were also plans for the economic reconstruction and development
of Tamil areas and World Tamil Unity. From this period, the Tamil
cultural movement becomes overtly political and begins to show
up its class character and ideological leaning.
It is at this stage that for the first time, the literary and
cultural movement touches the traditionally oppressed sections
of the Tamil people who had hitherto been beyond the pale. Both
in South India and Sri Lanka, post-Independence problems created
the conditions for the emergence of a band of writers who came
from the traditionally oppressed sections of Tamil society, that
is, the lower castes. Many of them were attracted by Marxism and
Communist organizations which provided them with a world view
and also the confidence to struggle against exploitation and articulate
their thoughts and feelings freely. As might be expected, their
level of literary education was somewhat low. But they ushered
in new experiences and visions into fiction, poetry and drama
using hitherto unheard of dialects, idioms, and expressions. They
were indifferent to "correct" Tamil itself as taught
by school teachers; classical Tamil was of no concern to them.
They in fact openly despised it and ridiculed its proponents.
To them linguistic restrictions or restraints were akin to social
and political oppression and all such barriers had to be broken
down. Harrison's general observation in a slightly different context
seems applicable here:
Where language differences tend to coincide with class distinctions,
language conflict is apt to coincide accordingly with the lines
of social conflict, greatly increasing it. And if the language
of the lower classes is spoken by them at a time when they increase
in numbers, or when they gain a bigger share in political and
economic power in society, then the language quarrels will be
part of a general process of their elevation in the society and
of their gradual bid for increasing social power.
The cultural nationalism of the Tamils is today at the cross
roads. It has two options before it. To tread the path of cultural
isolation and chauvinism or to identify those features that are
also common to the majority community and work out a democratic
way of life. The choice would appear to be obvious. But to do
that would also mean a national struggle by both communities obfuscating
the veil of narrow ethnic interests and marching towards a social
order in which there will be no exploitation of man by man.
Published in Ethnicity and Social Change in Sri Lanka - Papers
Presented at a Seminar organized by The Social Scientists Association
December 1979, SSA, 1984.
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