Sri Lankan Tamil dialects

As Tamil is a diglossic language, the differences between the standard written languages across the globe is minimal but the spoken varieties differ considerably. The spoken Tamil varieties in Sri Lanka although different from those of Tamil Nadu in India share some common features with the southern dialects of Tamil Nadu. Sri Lankan Tamil dialects retain many words and grammatical forms that are not in everyday use in Tamil Nadu, and use many other words slightly differently. In general, Sri Lankan Tamil dialects are considered to be more conservative than the continental Tamil dialects. ==Dialects==

Jaffna Tamil The dialect used in Jaffna preserves many features of Old Tamil that predate Tolkāppiyam, the earliest grammatical treatise of Tamil. According to Kamil Zvelebil a linguist, the Batticaloa Tamil dialect is the most literary like of all spoken dialects of Tamil, and it has preserved several very antique features, and has remained more true to the literary norm than any other form of Tamil while developing a few striking innovations. Although Batticaloa Tamil has some very specific features of vocabulary, it is classified with other Sri Lankan Tamil dialects as it is related to them by characteristic traits of its phonology. It also maintains some words that are unique to present day . Negombo Tamil The Negombo Tamil dialect, used in the Negombo area by bilingual fishers who otherwise identify themselves as Sinhalese, has undergone considerable morphosyntactic convergence with spoken or colloquial Sinhala as a consequence of contact with it. It has also developed a number of other grammatical traits under the probable influence of Sinhala, including a postposed indefinite article, an indefinitizing postclitic –sari (apparently modeled on Sinhala –hari), and case assignments for defective verbs that follow the Sinhala, rather than Tamil, patterns of agreement. ==See also==