Tamilology

Tamilology, a subset of the larger field of Dravidian studies, denotes study of the Tamil language, Tamil literature and the culture of the Tamil people

Definition

The term denotes the process of examining the study and contributions of Tamil language, Tamil literature and lifestyles of the native Tamil people. And here the term lifestyles covers a vast spectrum of the day-to-day activities of the native Tamil people as can be gleaned from their indigenous literature of all kinds, including grammatical, lexical, epic, lyrical, dramatic, theological, medical, philosophical, moral, jurisprudence and folk literature, containing data about their various rites and rituals, customs and manners, legends and fables, diseases and medicines, literature and education, society and culture, from time immemorial until now.

Documentation

The documentation of the lifestyle of native tamils has been done mainly by missionaries from different European countries like Ireland, Germany, France, and Portugal with the intent to convert the natives to Christianity. The missionaries documented the lifestyle of the natives and sent them in the form of daily manuscripts back to their country. These manuscripts are the current sources of the rich life and heritage of ancient Tamil natives.

Depending on the country the missionaries belonged to, Tamilology could branch out to German Tamilology, French Tamilology so on and so forth.

German Tamilology

German Tamilology is a branch of German Indology. German Indology is a composite research spectrum encompassing in it, the total estimation of and contributions to the many – faceted lifestyles of the Indians, their languages, literature and cultures.

That is, the estimation of the participation in and contributions to various branches of Tamil Studies by Germans, in a liberal sense, is German Tamilology. This will open a few other related new research avenues like German Telugology, German Malayalamology, German Kannadology, German Sanskritology and German Devanagariology etc. each of which will bring out German contributions to the respective native linguistic areas in India. That is, studies of Germans to Telugu language, literature and lifestyles of the indigenous Telugu people will form German Telugology and likewise, the other branches.