Black and Bright and Beautiful

[Raveen Satkurunathan]

On Mon, 13 Nov 2000 13:49:36 -0500, C.R. Selvakumar
<selvakum at VALLUVAR.UWATERLOO.CA> wrote:

>'>'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 was informed by Vishal that "Kalia is the surname of a Punjabi Brahmin
community and the father of Guru Nanak was named 'Kaalu Mehta'and that the
word Kaalu us used to address one's children affectionately EVEN in north
India. Saamvalaa Salonaa, is a common phrase in Hindi to state the
handsomeness of man who is dark and yet and yes, all the same, the color
black could be used to denote evil as well. For instance, in the
Ramacharitamanas, Sage Parashuram says of Lakshman: "Gaur varan shyama man
maahin"  (He is of a fair color, but is dark in mind)." Further a person
could be named "even a 'Goru' (aka Goraylal) because he was very fair". So
the situation is not much different than what exists among contemporary
Tamil society with respect to color black vs. White.

Raveen