WHATEVER!!!!: Learning English and Public Speaking: Tips for Tamils of Rural Tamilnadu

Hello World,

14 years ago, I stepped into a place called college and sat along with my fellow classmates. Out of approximately 58 in our class, 7 of us were from the Chennai region. Since we were from the urban landscape which has a mix of cultures and access to various value added services, we grew up in a situation where speaking languages other than our native language was a necessity to some extent. We grew up speaking and studying Hindi and English as a consequence.

My fellow classmates, baring those who from the city, came from villages and towns not as big as Chennai. They grew up in a situation where 99% of their lives depended on their native language, Tamil. Some of them even did their schooling in Tamil medium.

Over the semesters during college, I noticed that speaking English was considered a 'Respected Skill' and not being able to converse in English meant something inferior. We city-bred kids were not Shakespeare ourselves but we were comfortable dancing with our deficiencies. We were comfortable using the few words we knew to write and speak in English. My fellow classmates from rural Tamilnadu did not feel that way as they did not have the access to English as much as we city-bred kids did back then.

Often times, lecturers would insult my fellow classmates by forcing them to speak in English and made sure they felt bad for not being able to speak up in front of the class. I now know that 70% of the difficulty they faced was fear of public speaking which I share with them. However, the remaining 30% was their inability to construct simple sentences in English.

It wasn't fault and still they paid heavily for something that was thrust on them.

Over the years, I also noticed some of my relatives were curious about learning to speak English and they would ask me about it. I would tell them that I am not an expert and I myself make mistakes and that most people do so.

It took me years to figure out that my fellow Tamils from rural Tamilnadu did not have a difficulty in learning English.

All they have been battling is their difficulty in figuring out how they can teach themselves.

Here I am, more than a decade after I witnessed my fellow classmates being insulted for 'Bad English', with what I consider a starting point to this burning yet untouched issue.

I sincerely hope, this discussion with a specialist in public speaking, will help my fellow Tamils of rural Tamilnadu to evolve their own self-learning schemes so they can communicate effectively in English: