TongueTiedinSingaporeALanguagePolicyforTamil.pptVIP

Tongue-Tied in Singapore: A Language Policy for Tamil? Harold F. Schiffman Dept. of South Asia Studies University of Pennsylvania Introduction: Tamil situation in Singapore: Lends itself ideally to the study of minority language maintenance: Tamil community is small: Indians constitute around 7% of the population, of which Tamils constitute 60%. History and demographics well known. Tamil community acknowledged to be facing a number of crises: Tamil as a home language not being maintained by the better-educated. Role of Education Schooling seen as the mainstay of language maintenance Tamil Ed