Learning Tamil is Easy!
Tamil is a beautiful classical language and learning the basic building blocks of the language doesn't take much time. Check out our posts to learn basic Tamil grammar from the primary letters to all the special characters.
Literary Tamil vs. Spoken Tamil
Literary (or written) Tamil is distinct from colloquial or spoken Tamil. Literary Tamil is used in formal settings, written publications and public speech. Spoken Tamil is used by Tamils for every day speech and varies from region to region. Tamil grammar is the same for both literary and colloquial, however some differences in suffixes and vocabulary can be found.
Why learn the Tamil alphabet?
Learning a language means embracing it and understanding its building blocks. Learning Tamil letters will make learning spoken Tamil so much easier. Being able to read and understand Tamil will give you access to infinite opportunities to read and discover new literature and learn more about the Tamil culture. Plus, it only takes a couple of hours to learn the Primary letters.
Primary letters vs. Secondary letters
The Tamil Alphabet (தமிழ் நெடுங்கணக்கு) consists of 247 letters.
Amongst those, there are 30 primary letters: 12 vowels and 18 consonants.
Combining the vowels and consonants create 216 compound letters. The special character ஃ (achenam), together with the 216 compound letters make up the secondary letters.
Tamil also uses grantha letters to write words derived/loaned from other languages.
Watch our video on Primary Letters to learn the basic building blocks of Tamil!
Ready to learn the vowels and consonants? Download our free Anki Decks and start learning!
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