Emergence of Malayalam as an Independent Classical Language-An Overview

In South Asia, an area of staggering linguistic diversity are found languages spoken by nearly one quarter of the worlds population representing at least five major language families and its sub families. Among them Dravidian is the second largest language family spoken in South Asia and it is the fifth largest linguistic family in the globe. Dravidian family consist of more than twenty six languages in which Tamil, Malayalam, Telugu and Kannada have been recognized as classical languages. This paper is about the development of Malayalam language as an independent one from the Proto Dravidian family. Throughout this paper it is attempted to give a simple and brief idea about the historical development and periodisation of Malayalam language. Hence this will be useful for both native and non-native Malayalam speakers who are in the research field.