Law at Large: Notes on the Public Mediation of Community in the Juridical Field

Tamil is one of the longest continuous written traditions of any language in the world. It is also very much a language of the modern world—an official language in three countries, and a recognised minority language in several others that is used across a variety of domains, from education to media to religious practice, literature, everyday talk, and beyond. To engage with Tamil and its culture, in all their dimensions is, therefore, to grapple with social, political, religious, literary, and performative traditions of remarkable depth, nuance and complexity.

The Chicago Tamil Forum, an annual workshop at the University of Chicago that brings together international scholars of Tamil language, culture, and history, began in 2014 to advance exciting new approaches to understanding Tamil and the Tamil-speaking world. This volume collects sixteen papers presented at the Forum between 2014 and 2023, which together seek to understand Tamil as a site of politics and power, to explore Tamil language and literature as a medium of social life, and to unravel the dynamics of Tamil within a changing media landscape. The chapters explore a wide range of topics, from studies of poetics, literature and lexicography to language politics, caste and political identity; from populist politics and filmic stardom to theatrical adaption and early modern temple murals.

Offering diverse perspectives on South India and disciplinary approaches to studying it, this volume refines and redefines the field of Tamil Studies. It will be of interest to scholars of South India as well as to South Asianists of all stripes.