This Post-doctoral research project will cover a large area of three centuries from 1706 to 2006 i.e. from the year the first German
Lutheran Missionary Ziegenbalg arrived in Tamilnadu till the tercentenary commemorative year of 2006. That is, from the times of Ziegenbalg
in 1706 till the present times of German Tamil scholars like Arno Lehmann, Thomas Lehmann, Kapp, Ulrike Niklas, Thomas Malten etc.
A special type of methodology is to be devised with certain defining parameters. This is about nearly 150 Germans, who came to Tamil Nadu,
learnt Tamil language and interacted considerably with the native Tamil people, during the last 300 years.
Their religious activities are to be left out and only their academic, socio-economic, cultural, medical and other allied non-religious
activities, interactions and contributions are to be brought out in this project. For this, research data from diaries, palmleaves,
station registers, travel accounts, books, journals, souvenirs, commemorative volumes, pamphlets, etc. are to be gleaned and consulted in which
information about these Germans and their activities in Tamil Nadu can be found. The entire project is to be divided into three sections.
The first section will consist of only the literature list for the 18th, 19th and the 20th century German-Tamil scholars.
The second section
will consist of detailed biographical data about these Germans in the chronological order and the third section will consist of subject wise
list of these Germans, with their contributions, interactions and involvements - i.e. such of those Germans who specialized in Tamil language
and literature will be classified under �Language and literature� group, those who specialized in Tamil Siddha medicine, will come under
�Tropical Herbology�, Germans who specialized in the indigenous flora and fauna will be classified under �Tropical flora and fauna,�
Germans who specialized in the indigenous society, will be classified under �Public Relations� and so on.
[Updated Feb 2011] The project has been successfully completed. Please click on the following link to see the access the complete project
