It is said that “Before the birth of stones and sand, brave tamil man was born”. It portrays the heritage of tamil language. It is the oldest Dravidian language ,along with Chinese, Greek, Sanskrit and others. It is one of the world’s classical languages. All south indian language belong to single indian group known as the family of tamil language. Tamil Nadu is the main land of tamil speaking people. More than 8 crore tamils live in Tamil Nadu and Pondicherry. The first book of tamil grammar was Agayathiyam but the scripts of Agathiyam were never available. So tholkappiyam was accepted as the first book of tamil grammar.
The tamil architecture is one of the most ancient and best architecture in the world. The style and techniques was developed in the tamil regions over 1000 years. It is one of the longest surviving classical language in the world. Tamil literature has existed for over 2000 years. The earliest period of Tamil literature, Sangam literature is dated from Ca 300 BEC 300 CE. More than 55% of the epigraphical inscriptions found by the archaeological survey of India are in the Tamil language. It has the oldest extant literature among other Dravidian language.
Apart from major festivals like Deepavali, Pongal, Aadi Peruku in every villages and towns, the inhabitants celebrate festivals for the local gods once a year and the time varies from place to place. Most of these festivals are related to the goddess Maariyamman, the mother goddess of rain. The kings of ancient tamizhagam created sangams of Iyal Isai Nadagam (Litrature, music, drama). Music in Tamil Nadu had different forms. They are Villuppattu, Nattuppurappattu, Ballads that convey folklore and folk history.
One of the important litrary piece is Silappathikaram. The Jain poet prince Illango Adigal is created with this world. He is reputed brother of Senguttuvan from chera dynacity. Silappatikkaram has many references to historical events and personalities. Although is has been accepted as reliable source of history by many historians because of the inclusion of many exaggerated events and achievements of the ancient kings.
So to conclude I propose some suggestions like effective bilingualism and continued use of tamil at higher level education to reverse the trend or a atleast and enable tamil to more successfully serve its purpose in maintaining the identity of the community.