Dravidian studies (also Dravidology) is the academic field devoted to the

Dravidian languages The Dravidian languages (or sometimes Dravidic) are a family of languages spoken by 250 million people, mainly in southern India, north-east Sri Lanka, and south-west Pakistan. Since the colonial era, there have been small but significant ...

, literature, and

culture Culture () is an umbrella term which encompasses the social behavior, institutions, and norms found in human societies, as well as the knowledge, beliefs, arts, laws, customs, capabilities, and habits of the individuals in these groups ...

. It is a superset of Tamil studies and a subset of

South Asian studies Indology, also known as South Asian studies, is the academic study of the history and cultures, languages, and literature of the Indian subcontinent, and as such is a subset of Asian studies. The term ''Indology'' (in German, ''Indologie'') is o ...

Early missionaries

The 16th to 18th century missionaries who wrote Tamil grammars or lexica include Henrique Henriques,

Bartholomaeus Ziegenbalg Bartholomeus or Bartholomaeus or Barthelomaeus is a masculine Latin given name, the Latin equivalent of Bartholomew. The German cognate is Bartholomäus. Notable people with the name include: * Bartholomeus Amadeus degli Amidei (died 1266), Ita ...

and Constantino Giuseppe Beschi.

Dravidian language hypothesis

The recognition that the Dravidian languages were a phylogenetic unit separate from Indo-European dates to 1816, and was presented by F. W. Ellis, Collector of Madras, at the College of Fort St. George.

Nineteenth-century experts

The 19th century contributors to the field of Dravidology were:

Twentieth-century experts

The noted Dravidologists from the twentieth century are:

Contemporary programs

The Dravidian University at

Kuppam Kuppam is a Granite City of Andhra Pradesh. Kuppam is a Municipality in Chittoor district of the Indian state of Andhra Pradesh located 115.8 kilometers South-East of Bangalore, the Capital City of Karnataka and 243 kilometers West of Chenna ...

Andhra Pradesh Andhra Pradesh (, abbr. AP) is a state in the south-eastern coastal region of India. It is the seventh-largest state by area covering an area of and tenth-most populous state with 49,386,799 inhabitants. It is bordered by Telangana to the ...

has created Chairs in the names of Western and Dravidian scholars to encourage research in individual Dravidian languages as well as comparative Dravidian studies: * Bishop Caldwell's Chair for Dravidian Studies * C. P. Brown's Chair for Telugu Studies *

Kittel 220px, A kittel A ''kittel'' ( yi, קיטל) is a white linen or cotton robe worn by religious Ashkenazi Jews on holidays, in the synagogue or at home when leading the Passover seder. Kittels are sometimes worn by grooms. It is also customary for ...

Chair for

Kannada Kannada (; ಕನ್ನಡ, ), originally romanised Canarese, is a Dravidian language spoken predominantly by the people of Karnataka in southwestern India, with minorities in all neighbouring states. It has around 47 million native s ...

Studies * Constantine Beschi Chair for Tamil Studies * Gundert Chair for

Malayalam Malayalam (; , ) is a Dravidian languages, Dravidian language spoken in the Indian state of Kerala and the union territories of Lakshadweep and Puducherry (union territory), Puducherry (Mahé district) by the Malayali people. It is one of 2 ...

Studies.

Literature

Robert Caldwell Robert Caldwell (7 May 1814 – 28 August 1891) was a missionary for London Missionary Society. He arrived in India at age 24, studied the local language to spread the word of Bible in a vernacular language, studies that led him to author a tex ...

, ''Comparative Grammar of Dravidian Languages'' (1856; revised edition 1875). * *Thomas R. Trautmann, ''Languages and nations: the Dravidian proof in colonial Madras'', University of California Press, 2006, ISBN University of California Press, 2006. *

Film

The 2021 Indian documentary film

Dreaming of Words ''Dreaming of Words'' is a 2021 Indian documentary film directed and produced by Nandan. ''Dreaming of Words'' has received numerous accolades including National Film Award for Best Educational/Motivational/Instructional Film (2020) awarded to ...

traces the life and work of

Njattyela Sreedharan Njattyela Sreedharan ( ml, ഞാറ്റ്യേല ശ്രീധരൻ; born in 1938) is a lexicographer from Thalassery in Kerala. He is known for compiling a dictionary connecting four major Dravidian languages Malayalam, Kannada, Tamil a ...

, a fourth standard drop-out, who compiled a multilingual dictionary connecting four major

Tamil Tamil may refer to: * Tamils, an ethnic group native to India and some other parts of Asia **Sri Lankan Tamils, Tamil people native to Sri Lanka also called ilankai tamils **Tamil Malaysians, Tamil people native to Malaysia * Tamil language, nativ ...

and Telugu. Travelling across four states and doing extensive research, he spent twenty five years making this multilingual dictionary.

References

External links

*Dravidian studies in the Netherlands, IIAS newsletter (2005

http://www.iias.nl/nl/37/IIAS_NL37_21.pdf]
Extracts from T.R.Sesha Iyengar's "Dravidian India" by Dr. Samar Abbas, Bhubaneshwar, 4/8/2003
* Roja Muthiah Research Library {{Portalbar, India Indology