A blogger attempts to cast Shakespeare into Tamil English

This is one of the funniest tanglish related posts in the blogosphere. Unfortunately few non-tamil people can actually understand the humour involved. The post can be read here
http://krishashok.wordpress.com/2007/10/09/shakespeare-in-louww/
One of the things to be observed is that the madras bashai, or the tamil english is heavily tamil influenced, with barely a few english words. See if you can make out the english words in these speech balloons.

Another encyclopedia entry regarding Tanglish

This is an encyclopedia entry for Tanglish, source can be clicked on

Encyclopedia > Tanglish

Madras bashai (also known as Madras Tamil and informally as Tanglish) is a language spoken in the city of Chennai, India. It is a loose polyglot blend of Tamil and English, with some loan words from Telugu, Kannada and Hindi. The term literally means "Madras language" in Tamil.

Many linguists classify it as a dialect of Tamil, but some debate exists over whether this is a valid classification. Specifically, Madras bashai tends to use English words for nouns and non-trivial verbs, and Tamil for prepositions and conjunctions. Its grammar however is not easily categorized into one or the other. It does not qualify as pidgin English (or Engrish) since it does not use English grammar rules or prepositions, nor is it a result of an unsuccessful attempt to speak correct English.

• Beku - Imbecile. Pronounced like English "bake u".
• Figuru - Attractive woman. From English "figure", as in "She's got a good figure".
• Gaali - Sealed, as in "His fate is sealed". From Tamil, originally meaning "empty".
• Joadreppai - Cobbler. Etymology unknown, but possibly from Hindi joota (shoe) and English "repair".
• Jollu - To ogle attractive women. From Tamil for "saliva", implying salivation.
• Joot - Get started. Pronounced exactly like the English "jute". Etymology unknown.
• KD - Petty crook. From English "known defaulter", older Chennai police terminology.
• Kaiyendhi Bhavan - Roadside food vendor, equivalent to a hotdog stand in the US. From Tamil for "hand-to-mouth restaurant". Not necessarily pejorative. Compare "Muniyandi Vilas".
• Kalakaradhu - To impress with one's performance. From Tamil, literally "to mix", "to stir".
• Kasmaalam - Synonymous with "idiot", possibly from Sanskrit kash malam (black hair)
• Leevu - Holiday. From English "leave".
• Lollu - Anything unpleasant. From Tamil for the sound made by a dog (analogous to "bow wow" in English). Probably a neologism from a Satyaraj movie.
• Lollu party - Unpleasant person, especially one's boss at work.
• Machi - Synonymous with "dude". Cannot be used with strangers. Etymology unknown.
• Mama velai - Pimping, both literally and figuratively. From Tamil for "uncle job".
• Military hotel - Restaurant that serves non-vegetarian food.
• Mineema - Female equivalent of "Muniyandi".
• Muniyandi - Economically backward male, implying a degree of unsophistication and uncouthness.
• Muniyandi Vilas - Low grade restaurant. Pejorative. Compare "Kaiyendhi Bhavan".
• Naina - A negative version of "dude", used to imply criticism. Can also be used with strangers. Probably a corrupted version of Telugu Nana (father).
• OB adikaradhu - To waste time. OB is pronounced as the individual letters O and B. Etymology unknown.
• Outte - Same as "Gaali". From English "out", used in the context of cricket or other sports.
• Paal mararadhu - To switch camps, to betray a confidence. From Tamil, "to change milk".
• Phosphata - Same as "Sulphata".
• Poramboku - Orphaned, abandoned. Used as an abuse for bad driving.
• Rowdy - Ruffian. Means the same in English, but used much more commonly in India.
• Rowdy-sheet - The rap sheet of a rowdy known to the police.
• Rowdy-sheeter - A rowdy who has a rowdy-sheet.
• Saavugraaki - Same as "Naina", but stronger sentiment. Uncertain origin.
• Sight adikaradhu - Same as "Jollu". From English sight and Tamil adikaradhu, "to beat".
• Sulphata - Cheap liquor that may contain methanol. Asking someone if they've had sulphata implies that they are severely uncoordinated.
• Voodu - House. From Tamil "veedu", meaning house.
• Vootle solltiya? - From Tamil, literally "Have you told [people] at home?". Connotes "Did you take leave of your loved ones when you left home?". Indicates really bad driving on the other person's part, and implies that he may not make it home alive.

These words and phrases may of course be strung together. For instance:

"Naina! Vootle solltiya? Saavugraaki!". By calling the other person "naina" and asking him whether he has taken leave of his loved ones, the speaker indicates that his interlocutor is driving in a very unsafe manner. The speaker uses "saavugraaki" to emphasize the point, and thus asserts his superior driving skills in the situation.

A large part of Madras bashai is devoted to cursing other drivers on the road.

Grammar

The following examples illustrates the difference between Madras bashai, English and Tamil:

English	Tamil	Madras bashai
Go fast! (Verb Adverb)	Vegamaa po! (Adverb Verb)	Speeda po! (EnglishNoun TamilVerb)
Go straight! (Verb Adverb)	Nera po! (Adverb Verb)	Seedhava po! (HindiAdverb TamilVerb)

Questions with yes/no answers are framed by saying the statement whose truth is to be verified (using the participle if necessary) and then saying "aa" at the end with a rising inflexion like a question. If the statement already ends in an "aa" or other interfering vowel sound, then the questioning "aa" can be made "vaa" in the interest of euphonics.

English	Madras bashai
Are you ready?	Ready-aa?
Did you sleep? ("Have you slept?")	Slept-aa?
Is it OK?	OK-vaa?

Some people tend to carry the "-aa" even into full English conversations from force of habit.

Another observation on south indian english.

I quote from another blog, where there is a lot of discussion about several dialect words.

Cycle Gap: Tamil for trying to get things done without anyone noticing it. (Wikipedia page on Madras Tamil)

'Cycle gap' provides a metaphor in South Indian English for an indigenous brand of opportunism. Where others may give up, a certain type of individual will discover a narrow window of opportunity and try to squeeze through. If he succeeds, chances are he'll also try to pull in all his friends, brothers, parents, uncles and what-have-you after him, and a mad scramble will result, till someone notices and slams the window shut. Hence, the local Chennai idiom, 'to try and squeeze an auto-rickshaw through a cycle gap'.

The following examples illustrate the figurative sense of the term:
See, we are a cycle gap country. If judgements and policies are not watertight and leave a crack in the door for exceptional cases. We will attempt to drive a 18 wheeler through that gap. (Reality Check India)

My cousin was here last week, looking to sneak through the proverbial “cycle-gap” in the hallowed doors of TCS, CTS, Wipro, Satyam and Infosys which would make her the financially pampered, mentally tortured, socially showcased, BIG 5 IT professional. (ExpertDabbler)

The interesting thing about cycle gap is that it is now widely used in films, and in the everyday conversations we hear. These examples from blogs are not very useful.....they show its use in English constructions, in which they are used as idiomatic expressions with the marker 'proverbial'. But when used in Tamil constructions, it becomes a metaphor.
'Cycle gap la poondhu panam vangitaya?'
Did you sneak through the cycle gap to get your money back?

'galeej' words in a wider context - blogs by tamil speaking indians

Let me introduce the concept of galeej here before making my two observations for the week.
The first is a blog that has an informal discussion of galeej terms. Given above is a screenshot of the discussion featured.

Introduction and some preliminary observations.

Greetings to anyone who is reading this blog. It's a part of my assessment for a module on lexicography and lexicology, and will catalog some of my observations on the dialect/jargon spoken by my close friends at the National University of Singapore, where I am doing a course in English Language.
I have been late in setting up the blog, and there must be two observations per week, hence, I shall write one blog post summarising both my observations.
Wanted to start of the blog with something that has been an obsession of sorts for me for quite a long time: the jargon/dialect spoken by my Indian Tamil friends at NUS.
They are mostly engineering students from Chennai and other Tamil Nadu towns. Their language is rich with tamil words and more importantly, tamil slang words. Tamil slang is itself replete with several english words that suffer meaning shifts to mean things hardly intended originally. The Indian tamils at NUS have not been behind in adding new words to this cauldron of Tamil, English and even the odd Hindi word. Here are some, and some instances of their usage. This slang, often known as Madras Tamil, or Thanglish (Tamil + English) is largely spoken by Chennai youths. These are the two things I have observed, one is universal to all Madras Tamil speakers, another is specific to NUS students.
1) Figure: an attractive girl. This is from the heartland, almost every tamilian in NUS, even the Singaporean Tamils will tell you what this means. In fact, its about time to give you this valuable link. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Madras_Tamil
figure is used quite frequently in Tamil films to refer to the woman the hero has fallen in love with. The word figure, referring to an attractive girl probably evolved from the fact that attractive women usually have good figures..
2) Helmet: This is one word that is entirely restricted to NUS Tamil Indians. A 'helmet' in NUS Indian Tamil parlance, is someone who might as well be wearing a helmet for all the attention he gets from 'figures', and all the attention he gives them. Helmet has barely spread beyond the confines of the Tamil gang in NUS. Here is an instance of its use in facebook. http://www.facebook.com/search/?q=rushi+padhuman&init=quick#/photo.php?pid=709993&id=227701264
This was a snarky response to the twee smiley collections that fb users were tagging with names of friends, like so.
http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?pid=1356711&op=1&o=global&view=global&subj=718125373&id=512269319
Since most of the smiley tagging was being done by girls, it was only natural to respond with the helmet assortment.
The concept of priming, is significant here. Both words have acquired meanings in slang that are not available in standard English. As such for speakers of madras tamil, they recall things other than what they refer to. If one were to conduct a priming experiment with one group of confirmed Madras Tamil speakers and non madras tamil speakers, and have the word helmet precede the word figure, the madras tamil speakers would pick up the word with far greater frequency.
I am yet to tease out the far reaching implications of this idea, but one thing that does come to mind: if jargon words are special cases of priming, that is, where often very small groups are primed for certain word pairs, wouldn't it be useful as a test for collocation in general? We cannot easily trace the origin of collocations, but perhaps we can see how collocations slowly begin to form over a period of time by examining a group of jargon users?
Going further, can we say that just as pidgins are useful for the study of language's whose grammar is in the making, perhaps jargon is lexicon in the making?
Would appreciate your comments on this.