Customer Reviews

Colloquial Tamil: The Complete Course for Beginners (Colloquial Series)

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I originally wrote a review of this book that was somewhat negative. Now that I've had a chance to review the field of works available on this subject, I feel inclined to upgrade my review somewhat.

The work has some decided pluses and minuses. On the plus side, it is probably the most accurate description of spoken Tamil that you will find. This is more of an accolade than it may sound. It is very difficult to pin down what "proper" spoken Tamil consists of, but this book does a better job than anything else in describing Tamil as it is spoken in Chennai.

In fact, it does a bit too thorough a job. Tamil's phonetic system is not simple, and this book does not go out of its way to make it any easier. The new student might be excused at first blush from not believing that what he hears on the CD's is actually the same dialogues he reads in the book; the authors made a point of speaking at a fast clip, like normal Tamil, but it leaves little scope for the learner to get his arms around the pronunciation. There are sound files available online at various websites that are easier for the beginning learner to deal with than the ones designed for this book.

There are other drawbacks to the book that can't be disregarded. Some portions of the grammar are simply not described; the authors apparently don't care to explain what the Tamil infinitive form is and how it differs from the stem - the learner is left to figure that out for him/herself. The types of adjectival endings are not explained in sufficient detail. Worst of all, the vocabulary lists purport to indicate what chapter a word was introduced, and it is wrong in almost every occasion, and in fact a lot of words are used in the lessons that are never explained. This fact tends to pull the rug out for me on whatever virtues the book has.

Despite all this, it is the best bet in town if you want to learn some Tamil on your own. But it won't be easy.

Though the authors have done a commendable job simplifying a very difficult language, there are several things that could be improved. The course is transliterated in Roman script rather than Tamil. Though useful perhaps for taking a holiday to India, it's not helpful for someone truly interested in learning the language. Also, the audio part of the course is spoken so fast that it's almost impossible for a beginner to grasp the sounds yet alone were the words break. I persistently struggled through it for one year before visiting India and will probably struggle another year since there is there is no other audio instruction available.

This is probably not the ideal book if you have NEVER heard/attempted spoken tamil before. But, if you are familiar with another Indian/South Indian language and want to learn Tamil, this is a good book. There are several very realistic dialogues with English transations that are used as a teaching aid throughout the book. Personally, I have found the book extremely useful, but I have lived in Chennai for 4 years and I can understand most of it. Thanks to this book, I have been able to talk to my mother-in-law in near-fluent tamil in about 4 weeks. Another problem is there aren't too many other Tamil books out there, so by all means, give this a try. Overall, it is a very well written book.

There are so many challenges in studying Tamil that in a book of this size it is necessary to consider certain trade-offs. The spoken language differs considerably from the written, and it is a very difficult language to pin down to a phonetic system. So what we have here is a book that introduces the alphabet, but has little else to do with writing. Another challenge comes from the speed with which Tamilians usually speak their language; the authors have opted for authenticity, which means the speakers are talking very rapidly indeed, to a point where it is even hard to pick out individual words. One solution might be to buy this book along with Kausalya Hart's 'Tamil for Beginners' (audio should be available from Cal-Berkeley, and the author's recording is at a much easier pace to follow). Also, the Hart book teaches the alphabet completely at the beginning and it is used in all of the subsequent lessons.

Still, 'Colloquial Tamil' is a useful book to have, given the very few resources available for Tamil learners. The dialogues get more interesting as the work moves along, and with a lot of practice listening to the accompanying CDs (sold separately), they will become clearer. A language of instant gratification this is not.

While there are many courses that teach you classical/written Tamil, there are not many courses for those interested in modern colloquial Tamil.
This one is really good. If you're interested in spoken Tamil, don't waste your time, just get this course. I would also recommend A Grammar of Spoken Tamil (by H. Schifmann).

This course is given in a semi-phonological transliteration (with Latin script and occasional IPA symbols).
The course is not in phonetic transcription (the way people pronounce it).

For example: poovoom (let's go / we'll go) is normally pronounced as [po'õ] and not as the transliteration may indicate.
These differences between the transliteration used and the actual pronunciations (recorded in the available audio material) are not explained.