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This book examines an oratorical revolution, a transformation of oratorical style linked to larger transformations in society at large. It explores the aesthetics of Tamil oratory and its relationship to democracy. It also highlights the centrality of language within the human condition.
Though Tamil oratory is a relatively new practice in South India, the Dravidian (or Tamil nationalist) style employs archaic forms of Tamil suggesting an ancient mode of speech. Beginning with the advent of mass democratic politics in the 1940s, a new generation of politicians adopted this style, known as ˜fine` or ˜beautiful Tamil` (centamil), for its distinct literary virtuosity, poesy, and alluring evocation of a pure Tamil past.
Bernard Bate explores the centamil phenomenon, arguing that its spectacular literacy and use of ceremonial procession, urban political ritual, posters, and praise poetry are critical components or a singularly Tamil mode of political modernity: a Dravidian neoclassicism. From this perspective, the centamil revolution and Dravidian neoclassicism suggest that modernity is not the mere successor of tradition but the production of tradition, and that this production is a primary modality of modernity, a new newness “ albeit a newness of old things.
ISBN 9780198072355
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