
Margherita Trento et al., "For the Love of Tamil: Essays in Honor of E. Annamalai" (UnionPress, 2025)
From New Books in Indian Religions by Marshall Poe
March 12, 2026 · 42 min · Episode 638
About this episode
This episode celebrates the contributions of E. Annamalai to Tamil studies through a collection of essays by leading scholars.
For the Love of Tamil celebrates the life and work of E. Annamalai (born 1938), the most prominent Tamil linguist of his generation. Spanning six decades and multiple continents, his scholarship ranges from formal analyses of Tamil syntax and semantics to studies of diglossia, pedagogy, language politics and Tamil poetics and literature. This volume collects contributions from leading scholars in various disciplines related to Tamil studies. Together, they reflect the intellectual breadth and disciplinary range of Annamalai’s work, covering classical and modern Tamil literature, grammatical traditions, linguistic analysis, sociolinguistics, and cultural history. They also highlight the lasting importance of Annamalai’s scholarship and demonstrate how his rigorous yet comprehensive approach to Tamil has influenced the study of language, literature, and society. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/indian-religions
People in this episode
Host: Marshall Poe
Guest: Margherita Trento
Topics covered
- Tamil linguistics
- Tamil literature
- sociolinguistics
- cultural history
- language politics
Keywords
- Tamil
- linguistics
- literature
- sociolinguistics
- E. Annamalai
- language politics
- cultural history
Mentioned in this episode
Organizations: UnionPress
Books & works: For the Love of Tamil
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