The influence of Tamil language on Sinhala Hybrid Words

Abstract

Code mixing in an important phenomenon where people of multicultural and multilingual society interact everyday. Though Sinhala language is from Indo Aryan family ,it has been very much influenced by the Tamil language which belongs to the Dravidian language family. This paper attempts to explore the quantum of impact over Sinhala language by Tamil. Code mixing can be occurred in different levels. however this research is restricted to only at the lexical level, specially focused on Hybrid Words. Some instances for Hybrid words from Tamil into Sinhala language are as follows: müttu karanawa (to joint) tallu kereanawa (to push) mattam keranaea (to level) murandu venava (to be stubborn) These verbs are from Tamil language. Though Tamil language have been less open to the Sinhala language, how could Sinhala language influenced by the Tamil language will also be discussed in this research.