Contains 35 Graded Lessons Designed to Toach the Grammar and Vocabulary Necessary for a Functional Knowtecige of the Language
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nnoilmitmt mitAilkom ED 030 093 AL 001 790 By -Moag. Rachel. Meag. Rodney A Course in Colloquial Malayalam. Wisconsin Univ.. Milwaukee. Spons Agency-Peace Corps (Dept. of State), Washing.ton. D.C. Pub Date Jun 67 Note -507p. EDRS Price MF 12.00 HC -$25.45 . Descriptors -Audiolingual Methods. Cultural. Context. Field Instruction. Glossaries. Grammar. Instructional Materials.*LanguageInstruction.Malayalam,*PatternDrills(Language). Phonology. Pronunciation Instruction. Volunteer Training. Writing . This text is designed to teach collociuial Malayalam ofthe kind that will be. understood throughout Kerala to the Peace Corps volunteersgoing to India's Kerala State. The text is aural-oral in approach andis made up .of two main parts. Part I contains 35 graded lessons designed to toach the grammar and vocabulary necessary for a functional knowtecige of the language. Lessons consist of short conversations, gl_rammar drills and excilanations. and pronunciation drills and notes. Linguistic Field Exercises, a set of gradedexercises to train the volunteer to elicit and analyze linguisiic da% in the field.are interspersed with the other drills in Part I. Part II has extra conversations coVering generalliving situations. as well as simplified excerpts from Kerala government publications in Malayalam treating various topics with which volunteers often deal. These unitsare not graded and may be taught or used as the coordinatorsees lit. Part II, along with the appendixes. is intended primanly to serve the volunteer .in the field. Appendixes inckide: (1)suggestions for continued learning in Kerala, (2) the Malayalam writing system. (3) additionalgrammar notes and exercises, (4) names of days and months, and (5)a 49lossary. (DO) U.S. DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH, EDUCATION& WELFARE OFFICE OF EDUCATION THIS DOCUMENT HAS BEEN REPRODUCEDEXACTLY AS RECEIVED FROM THE PERSON OR ORGANIZATION ORIGINATING IT.POINTS OF VIEW OR OPINIONS STATED DO NOT NECESSARILYREPRESENT OFFICIAL OFFICE OF EDUCATION POSITION OR POLICY. A COURSE IN COLLOQUIAL MALAYALAM by Rachel Moag and Rodney Moag U.S. Peace Corps University of Wisconsin Milwaukee, Wisconsin June, 1967 AL 001790 To the people of Kerala,whose patience, help and generosity has made our learningof their language a thrillingand rewarding experience. AL 001 790 PREFACE This present text is the outgrowth of two yearsof intensive work on the Malayalam language.It began in July of 1965 when my wife and I were invited to prepare materials to fill the 300hours allotted for language learning in the Peace Corps'"India 20" training program, held at theUniversity of Wisconsin - Milwaukee, Soptetnber through November of 1965. At that time, though wehad had consider- able experience with Hindi and had resided inNorth India, we had no knowledge whatsoever of Malayalam nor of any otherlanguage of the Dravidian family to which Malayalam belongs. Moreover, we were already committed to full time teaching jobs up toSeptember 1, when the training program was to begin. Six weeks of working weekends and eveningswith the full co- operation of two Malayalis gave us a goodbeginning grasp of Malayalam. This was achieved through the application of modernmethods of lin- guistic field analysis.In that period we also had made ready lessons to fill the first 25 hours, or one week out ofthe twelve-week course. At this point, I assumed the duties of languagecoordinator for the program. My wife, Rachel, and Mr. M. Sathyababu,working under my direction, preparedthe lessons to fill the remaining eleven weeks of training. Needless to say, it was nip and tuck all the way trying to pre- pare lessons which wouldcompletely fill four hours of classroom in- struction and one hour of language lab eachday for twelve weeks. The seven Malaya li classroom instructors gave us theirwhole- hearted cooperatiOn throughout, often sacrificing significant amounts of their free time to help us in running offand collating the lessons, making tapes for the language lab, and even taking extraclasses vi ! ! I 1 when necessary. The womenteachers deserve special credit for fre- quently providing the entirelanguage staff with sumptuous Malaya li meals: Itwas these relaxingtimes together which gave all of us the necessary diversion tobe able to maintain the tremendous workpace throughout the three months. Because of our newness to Malayalam,and the great haste with which the lessons were prepared, theMilwaukee materials had, of. necessity, to be consideredprovisional.It was then proposed that my wife and I go to Kerala, observe thelanguage in its natural environ- ment, see the volunteers functioningin the field, and prepare a set of Malayalam lessons specifically geared to meetthe language training needs of Peace Corps Volunteers going toKerala. In preparation for this we tookadditional coursework in both general and Dravidian linguistics at theUniversity of Chicago under the guk ance of two experts in Dravidianlinguistics, Prof. A. K. Ramanujan (who had served as our consultant inthe Milwaukee pro- gram) and Prof. Kamil Zvelebil (a visitingprofessor from the Yustuv Orientalni, Prague, Czeckoslovakia). Then, at theend of March, 1966, we set out for India. From this point on, our work on Malayalamhas been financed by the Peace Corps through a contract withthe University of Wis- consin Milwaukee. Arriving in Kerala, we settled in Trivandrum, the seatof Kerala University, in order to have the help andadvice of the fine staff and students of the Kerala University Departmentof Linguistics under the chairmanship of Prof. V. I. Subramonium. We, as well as the volunteers of "India 20" whohad preceded us to Kerala inDecember, experienced grave difficulty inunderstanding spoken Malayalam. We were able to makeourselves understood by speaking clearly, but we could not cope withthe extreme contractions vii and elisions which occur inrapid spoken Malayalam.It was apparent that the new text would have toinclude a great deal of material on just how Malayalam sounds atnormal speed. Our first month in Trivandrum was entirely consumedby making tape recordings of the language and analyzing thesewith the help cf Mr. Gopinathan Nayar and Miss Shama la Kumari, twostudents of the linguistics department. This also provided us with a newand more complete inventory of the more commonly usedstructures in the language, gave us afeeling for what words were most commonlyused by the local Malayalis, and thus, what kind of language PeaceCorps Volunteers needed in order to function in thefield. With a clearer view of what structuresand vocabulary to teach and data on how the resultant sentenceswould sound in normal rapid Malayalam, we were ready tobegin writing. The materials in the present text are,for the most part, totally new, so that it isby no means a mere revision ofthe materials pro- duced for the Milwaukee program.It is only in the later units of this book that a few drill sentencesand an occasional conversation from the earlier work have beenincluded. With the full time assistanceof Mr. Elias Moses, and part time help of several other Malaya liinformants, the writing went forth in earnest for the remainingfour months of our stay in Kerala.According to the proposal on whichthe contract was based, the text was tohave been ready for final typing inSeptember, 1966. However, as is often the case, the estimate of timerequired made before going into the field proved to be unrealistic.In addition to this severalunforseen delays (obtaining visas, clearing customs,finding a suitable location, etc.) made serious incursions intothe writing time. The result of all this wasthat we returned from India with a complete, but by no meansfinal draft of the text. My wife subsequently worked with my part-time assistancefrom November, 1966 through July 1, 1967 (taking a br:Ikin mid-March to givebirth to our second child), putting the draft iiii:ofinal form. Happily, the Peace Corpsagreed to support the additionalwork required and to readjust thedue date of the manuscript. Wewish to thank them specially for that.We also wish to thank the countless individuals not mentionedabove without whose graciouslyoffered and most gratefullyaccepted help this book could nothave been completed. Although these materials have nothad the kinks worked out of them by repeated classroom use, wefeel quite certain that the text will serve as a useful basictool for the training ofPeace Corps Volun- teers going to Kerala.We also hope that it will makethe language learning process as enjoyableand stimulating as possible forthose who use it. Rodney F. Moag Madison, Wisconsin June, 1967 1 TABLE OF CONTENTS ! Preface v Foreword to Co-ordinators and Teachers xxi Foreword to Students xxviii Pronunciation xxxv The Transcription xxxv Sound Ohanges xxxvii Some Hints on How to Work on Pronunciation xxxix PART I iuNiT onnu 1 paaDam onnu 1 Classroom Expressions I 1 The Quotative /ennu/ 4 Locative Case 1-11/ 6 Yes/No Questions /-o, -e/ 8 Vocabulary Notes: /manas, aaNu, viiDu/ 12 paaDam raN Du 13 On Keeping Your Books Closed 13 Classroom Expressions II 14 Dental Sounds /t, id, n/ 15 Dental Sounds, Drill 21 "Double" or "Geminate" Sounds 21 Double Sounds, Drill 22 Dental Sounds, Drill 22 Third Person Pronouns 23 Assimilation 27 Vocabulary Notes: /aaNkuTTi, peNkuTTi/ 35 /miinkaafi/ 36 paaDam muunnu 37 Retroflex Sounds /T, D, N/ 37 Retroflex Sounds, Drill 40 /-D-/ becomes /-TT-/ before /41/ 41 ix x Vowel Change: /i/ becomes [e]; /u/ becomes [o] 43 Dative Case plus uNDu/illa and veeNam/veeNDa 46 Various Words for "Yes" and "No" 48 Dative Case Endings /-u, -kku,