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Background

• There are many ways to increase the usage of Tamil outside of the classroom . This write-up will be concentrating on the two below : o

Increasing the Usage of Tamil by Students Outside Classroom

Bridging the diglossia between spoken and written Tamil

Diglossia in Singapore

In Singapore , classic diglossia exists among the four official languages ( Cruz-Ferreira , 354 ).

• Despite the existence of Singlish , English is a language that would survive and progress even further given the universal and economic nature of the language .

• Mandarin is another language that would survive given the state ’ s effort to promote Mandarin via the Speak Mandarin Campaign in 1979 , which reduced the usage of dialects in the public sphere . Though dialects are spoken at homes , the prevalence ofMandarin will push through .

• Malay is a language that could suffer from diglossia given the slight difference in the spoken and written variety . However , it has to be noted that Malay language ( the written form ) does not have much of a classical root , which implies the easy nature of the language ( Vega , 220 ). This would only result in students at least speaking either variations of Malay thereby keeping the language .

• For Tamil language , the written version takes on a classical note , which is interpreted as being difficult for students to comprehend . Nevertheless , students study the subject as a second language for exam purposes and are reluctant to speak the language given the slightly difficult nature of it .

• Also , unlike the thriving of spoken Malay , there is a lack of exposure to spoken Tamil for students due to the rise of English-speaking homes , which leads to a huge bridge in the language . Statistics show a decreasing trend in homes speaking Tamil : 52.2 % in the 1980s , 43.7 %, in the 1990s and 42.9 % in 2000 ( Seetha , 121 ).

Importance of bilingualism from young

• It was interestingly found in a research article based on research published by researchers from NUS Department of Psychology in Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences ( FASS ) that “ babies who learnt two languages mastered languagespecific rules faster than monolingual babies .” ( Singh , Poh , Fu 2016 )

• The research involved 70 babies .

• This shows that bilingualism is actually beneficial in mastering the languages and hence bilingualism must be encouraged and not discouraged by parents and teachers .

Definitions Diglossia

According to Dr . Harold Schiffman ( 1998 ) and Dr . Ferguson ( 1959 ), diglossia has to be understood as “ a situation in which one language community uses two ( usually closely related ) dialects or languages .”

Diglossia , according to Dr . Ferguson ( 1959 , 1972 ), Dr . Harold Schiffman ( 1998 ), Dr . Seethalakshmi ( n . d .), is a result of dividing the language into a high and low variety . The high being the formal , and classical Tamil , while the low being classified as the spoken variety that we usually hear on media and speak to our family and friends .

Author : Mr . Mohamed Shaik Faizal

Effective Bilingualism

Minister Goh Keng Swee termed it as bilingualism ‘ in terms of functional usage ’ of the languages . ( Lee 2008 )

‘ Effective bilingualism ’ is a situation where one ’ s knowledge of the second knowledge overlaps considerably so that they are able to effectively communicate with others using that second language . ( Hancock 1979 )

Dr . Harold Schiffman

• Professor of Dravidian Linguistics and Culture at Department of South Asia Studies , University of Pennsylvania

• His research interests focus on the linguistics of the Dravidian languages , especially Tamil , and to a lesser extent , Kannada , and in the area of language policy .

• Recent publications include A Reference Grammar of Spoken Tamil ( Cambridge University Press , 1999 )

Problems of diglossia in Tamil to the education system

• Students tend not to speak Tamil outside their classrooms as they feel that Tamil is difficult to comprehend .

• Tamil students when they meet one another are more comfortable in conversing in English as that way they do not go wrong in the conversation .

• Tamil , a mother tongue , has become a subject to attain grades .

Dr . Seethalakshmi � Associate Professor at Department of Asian Languages and Culture , National Institute of Education ( NIE ).

� Her teaching and research interests have been concerned primarily with Standard Spoken Tamil , curriculum review , classroom pedagogy , Tamil lexicography , teaching Tamil as a second language , Tamil pedagogy for the Tamil diaspora , sociolinguistics and the development of Tamil language and literature through mass media .