Introduction
‘Tamil’ means ‘sweetness’ and
‘Culture’ has been defined as ‘sweetness and light’. ‘Tamil’ and ‘Culture’,
therefore, make a most graceful combination both in Language and Life. Culture
has been defined as a ‘way of life’, as ‘sweetness and light’, as ‘activity of
thought and receptiveness to beauty and humane feeling’. These brief definitions
are sufficient to show the comprehensiveness and the indispensability of
culture, for one must have a way of life, and that way of life should be
combined with sweetness and light, with activity of thought, and with beauty
and humane feeling.
Tamil Culture is nothing else but
the Tamil way of life, a pattern of gracious living that has been formed during
the centuries of Tamil history. It has been conditioned by the land, the
climate, the language, the literature, the religions, the customs, the laws,
the food, the games and toys of the Tamil people, by the palmyra palm, the
gingelly oil, and the vegetables associated with them. Culture is a most
elusive and at the same time an all-embracing term.
