Chapters
- 01. Demographics
- 02. Linguistic Family
- 03. History & Origin
- 04. Script & Writing
- 05. Grammar
- 06. Limited Similarities
Both Hindi and the Tamil language originated in India. India is a country well known for its diversity not only in culture but also languages. India has given 22 languages the official status and there are at least 121 languages spoken there.
There is a common misconception that Hindi and Tamil are different dialects of the same language. This assumption is not accurate. Hindi and Tamil are distinct from each other. Both possesses its own rich history and cultural heritages.
Hindi is spoken mainly in the northern states in India while Tamil in the south. In India, there has been moves to introduce Hindi as a third language in schools across the country. However, this has received strong opposition from the southern state of Tamil Nadu which has always resisted Hindi “imposition”. In this article, we will explore the differences between these two languages.
If you are having difficulty deciding which language to learn, Hindi or Tamil, you will have to reflect on why you would like to learn the language? Are you travelling to India? Do your research to find out what language is spoken in the area that you are planning to visit as different areas speak different languages. Whichever language you choose to learn, Hindi or Tamil, it will definitely be an exciting journey.
Demographics
There are over 7000 languages spoken all over the world. Each has its own unique history. The number of speakers for a chosen language will differ depending on what statistics you choose to base it on: number of native speakers or number of second language speakers or both.
Hindi is the fourth most spoken language with around 344 million native speakers. It is spoken as a first language in 7 countries including India and Nepal. In India, Hindi is spoken mostly in the northern side of the country. The high number of Hindi speakers is due to the large population living in these countries. It is an official language in India, Fiji and a recognized minority language in the United Arab Emirates.
Tamil is spoken by over 80 million people, mostly in India where it is the official language in the state of Tamil Nadu and the Union Territory of Puducherry. It is also one of the official languages in Sri Lanka with roughly 4.7 million speakers and Singapore with over a million speakers respectively. It is also considered as one of the minority languages in Malaysia and Mauritius.
Linguistic Family
Hindi and Tamil originated from different linguistic families. Hindi belongs to the Indo-Aryan languages which is a branch of Indo-Iranian languages in the Indo-European language family. Sanskrit comes from the Indic sub-branch of the Indo-Iranian languages. The Vedic Sanskrit which is the oldest variety is seen in the Vedas (collection of hymns and religious text of ancient India). Indo-Aryan languages of India are Hindi, Bengali, Punjabi, Marathi, Gujarati, Bhojpuri, Maithili, Odia, Marwari, Sindhi, Assamese, Rajasthani, Rangpuri and Bishnupriya.
Tamil on the other hand, belongs to the Dravidian language family. There are around 70 languages that belong to the this group and they can be divided into North, Central, South Central and South branches. Tamil language belongs to the Southern branch. The largest four languages from the Dravidian family are Kannada, Malayalam, Tamil and Telugu. All Dravidian languages are believed to have evolved from a single Proto-Dravidian language which overtime developed into distinct languages as we know today.
History & Origin
Hindi language originated from the Khariboli dialect spoken in areas around Delhi which actually evolved from the Vedic Sanskrit language through Prakrit and Apabhramsha. The language is also influenced by Portugese, English, Arabic, Persian, Turkish and Dravidian. It was initially referred to as Hindavi by Amir Khusrau in the 13th and 14th centuries. Hindi and Urdu which are referred to as the Hindustani languages, branched out on its own when India and Pakistan became separate nations.
Hindi has many dialects. The dialect will depend on the geographical location of the speaker within the Hindi Belt (refers to the area in India where Hindi and Urdu are spoken by the majority of the population).
The Hindi literature history can be divided into four periods which are Adikal (the Early Period), Bhaktikal (the Devotional Period), Ritikal (the Scholastic Period) and Adhunikkal (the Modern Period).
Tamil is one of the oldest living language in the world. Historians are not able to give an exact date of origin for Tamil language which is a common issue in determining the origin of languages. The earliest Tamil inscriptions however can be dated back to third century BCE. This goes to show that Tamil language existed even before then to have written records.
Tamil language history is independent of Sanskrit unlike Hindi. The Sanskrit influence in the language only came later. Malayalam which is largely spoken in Kerala, is the closest to Tamil. It is believed to have branched out from Tamil. Therefore, there is a limited degree of mutual intelligibility between these two languages.
The Scholars have divided the history of the language into three periods which are Old Tamil, Middle Tamil and Modern Tamil. The evolution of the language can be seen over these three periods.
The history of Tamil literature can be divided into Sangam period, post Sangam period and contemporary period. Sangam period itself can be further divided into first sangam, second sangam and third sangam. The Sangam period which is known as the golden age of Tamil literature.
Script & Writing
The Hindi language is written using the Devanagari script which is heavily influenced by Sanskrit. Alphabets are called Varna Mala in Hindi. Varna means letter while Mala means chain. The official Hindi language has 46 letters which is made up of 11 vowels and 35 consonants. However, the traditional Hindi alphabet has 46 letters including 13 vowels and 33 consonants. The horizontal line seen above the letters serves as connecters where different letters are connected to form a word. There is a vertical right stroke in 24 out of the 36 consonants which indicates a full stop. Nowadays, a normal full stop is more frequently used to end a sentence. The nasal sounds are indicated by a dot above the letters. An interesting fact is that there are seven character differences between pronunciation (10 vowels and 35 consonants) and writing (13 vowels, 35 consonants, 4 combined consonants, and 2 binary consonants) in Hindi language.
Unlike Hindi, Tamil language has its own script. It evolved from using Brahmi script called Tamil Brahmi and Vatteluthu during the Old Tamil period to using the Pallava Grantha script during the Middle Tamil period where the Sanskrit influence is seen to weeding out Sanskrit in the Modern Tamil era.
The modern Tamil has 247 alphabets. It contains 12 vowels (Uyir Ezhuthukkal / soul letters) which can be divided in to two: independent vowels (used at the beginning of a syllable) and dependent vowels (used when the vowel follows a consonant). 18 consonants (Mei Ezhuthukkal / body letters), 1 special character (Ayutha Ezhuthu) and 216 combination of vowels and consonants (Uyir Mei Ezhuthukkal). Alphabets are known as Ezhuthu in Tamil. The consonants are further classified into three groups which are Vallinam (hard sounding consonants), Mellinam (soft sounding consonants) and Idayinam (letters that do not belong to the first two categories but fall between them).
Grammar
Both of these two languages possess their own individual characteristics:
- Tamil language is agglutinative. Grammatical functions are expressed using suffixes. Meanwhile, Hindi utilizes prefixes and suffixes to form words and to express grammatical relations. It also uses postpositions to express various case relationships.
- Tamil nouns (and pronouns) are divided into two categories which are rational and irrational. Humans and deities are classified as "rational", and all other nouns (animals, objects, abstract nouns) are classified as irrational. However, it depends on context. There are instances where irrational forms can be used for humans in a pejorative sense. Hindi nouns on the other hand is differentiated by gender: Masculine and Feminine.
- A typical Tamil verb consists of a verb base and a grammatical suffix. The base consists of a stem and two suffixes: one for voice, and one for expressing causality. Hindi verbs on the other hand, occur in the following forms: root (kha ‘eat’), imperfect stem (khatA), perfect stem (khayA), and infinitive (khanA).Find out here how to boost your Tamil language learning.
Limited Similarities
Tamil and Hindi share limited similarities such as:
- Both originate from India
- Words are written horizontally from left to right
- The standard word order is Subject-Object-Verb
There are some words that are similar between these two languages:
- Nyaay (Hindi), Nyaayam (Tamil) - which means "Justice"
- Dharma (Hindi), Dharmam (Tamil) - which means "Virtue"
- Bandhan (Hindi), Bandham (Tamil) - which means "Relationship"
What language would you like to learn? Hindi or Tamil? Reflect on why you would like to learn a new language before deciding. Do research on both Hindi and Tamil language features and see which one appeals to you. Superprof has tutors available for both languages!
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