Tamil Voice Over Agency

Working with translation and production companies

Adding audio visual services to your mix will create many new sales opportunities for your team.

Matinée has over 40 years of experience working alongside translation and production companies. So you can be sure our project managers are fully at home with the technical process of supervising and delivering localised material, in a professional and timely manner. We can add translation, voiceover and subtitling to your company’s offering, which will appear seamless to your clients and yet mesh easily with the processes in your own departments.

If you are a translation company, we will send you some helpful guidelines when providing us with copy or scripts, and we can either work from your translations or handle the whole project for you, including translation. If you are a production company, we will provide translations or subtitles in your preferred format; whether that’s subtitle-ready files (XML or PNG), or burnt in as fully-subtitled videos. Voiceover recordings can be supplied as edited files, or we can remix with the original music and effects and provide a finished video, ready to go.

Working seamlessly with your team, we can take on all or part of the process, according to your needs, and help widen your service offering.

A short history on the Tamil language

Tamil belongs to the South Dravidian branch of the Dravidian family of languages, along with others such as Malayalam, Kota, Toda, Kodagu, Kannada and Tulu. It is one of the oldest surviving classical languages in the world, and has the oldest literature of all the Dravidian languages.

Like other Dravidian languages, Tamil is descended from Proto-Dravidian, and has no roots in Sanskrit (unlike most of India’s other established literary languages). The influence of Sanskrit on Tamil was not evident until the period of the Pallava dynasty (2nd-9th century BCE).

Tamil literature goes back at least 2000 years; the earliest records which have been found date back to around the 5th century BCE. The history of the language is usually grouped into three phases:

• Old Tamil (5th century BCE – 8th century AD).
• Middle (or Medieval) Tamil (8th to 17th century).
• Modern Tamil (17th century to the present).

Which countries have Tamil as a national language?

Tamil is one of the 22 scheduled languages of India, and has official status in the Indian state of Tamil Nadu and the union territory of Puducherry. It is also an official language in Sri Lanka and Singapore.

How many people speak Tamil as their first language?

It is estimated that approximately 70 million people speak Tamil as their first language, with a further 10 million speaking it as a second language.

Tamil-speaking people – simply known as Tamils – form the largest stateless nation in the world. Along with the states/countries listed above, where the Tamil language has official status, there are large Tamil populations in Malaysia, Philippines, Mauritius, Fiji, South Africa, Indonesia, Thailand, Burma, Vietnam, Pakistan, and the Indian states of Kerala, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh and Andaman and Nicobar Islands.

Did you know…

• Tamil was the first language to be designated as a ‘Classical Language in India’ by the Indian government in 2004. Since then, five others have been accorded this status – Sanskrit, Telugu, Kannada, Malayalam and Oriya.
• Up until the 19th century, Malayalam was a dialect of Tamil. Today it is the closest relative of Tamil.
• There are several dialects of the language, based on geographical area as well as social status. The biggest regional variation is between the version of Tamil spoken in India, and that spoken in Sri Lanka.
• English words that have been borrowed from Tamil include cash, catamaran, curry, mango, pariah and poppadom.

The Indian economy

India’s economy is the tenth largest in the world by nominal GDP and the third largest by PPP. India is the 19th largest exporter and the 10th largest importer in the world.

Due to its large population there is still a lot of poverty in the country, despite its economic success. Although India has a growing high-tech sector, around half of the population is employed in agriculture (plus forestry, logging and fishing).

Around 22% of the population work in industry (which accounts for 26% of the GDP), and 27% in the service sector. Over 20 million people work in textile manufacturing.

India was one of the founding members of the World Trade Organisation’s precursor, and is a member of the G20 and BRICS (the association of five major emerging economies – Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa).