Black and Bright and Beautiful

[C.R. Selvakumar]

'>'2. One may still ask if  there are Tamil Brahmins who would name their children
'>'karuppan? And if not, why not? Please understand that I am not here to pass
'>'value judgments, to attacking or defend anybody, much less to pick up a fight,
'>'I am just wondering.

    As far as I know Tamil Brahmins, by and large,
    do not name their children in Tamil. So it is
    not surprising that there is no name like karuppan. Even
    Brahmins don't name their children as veLLaiyan (White) though
    among people belonging to other communities, veLLaiyan, veLLaicchaami,
    etc. are not uncommon.

    I don't know of any studies done about names of individuals (like there are
    studies about names of places) - but if one were to be conducted,
    it is my hypothesis that not even 2% of names of tamil brahmins
    would be tamil. Not only names of children, anything brahmins
    name (magazines, business establishments, apartment complex
    organizations etc.  etc.) will not be in tamil
    (may be with a few rare exceptions).
    I don't know whether this was the situation, say some 1000 years ago.

    C.R.Selvakumar

'>'
'>'V. V. Raman
'>'November 13, 2000
'>'