Questions and Commands
Everything you have learnt so far is enough for you to create full and complex sentences that you can use to have any sort of conversation. The only remaining bits that are missing are questions and commands.
You can make any sentence into a question by adding a -ஆ｢-ā｣ to the last word of that sentence.
You can sometimes add the suffix -ஆ｢-ā｣ to other words than the last one of the sentence to emphasize another word.
You can add this to almost every word. However, as always, there are some exceptions like for example "adjectives" that can't have the suffix.
Another way to create a question is to use the correct question word. In these cases, you do not need to add the -ஆ｢-ā｣ suffix. But remember to use the correct declension of that question word.
Note that in the second example, the verb has changed. Since யார்｢yār｣ replaced the first person நான்｢nāṉ｣ the verb has to reflect that change, too, by using the appropriate person-marker-suffix.
The imperative
Whenever you want to make a request or a command or forbid someone to do something, you will use an imperative clause:
Bring me some water.
Do not touch my hair.
Please help me.
In English, you can't tell from the sentences verb if you are addressing one or multiple people. Tamil, however, has two different suffixes for the imperative.
Actually, only one. The singular imperative is simply the verb stem. For the imperative plural, you will use the -உங்கள்｢-uṅkaḷ｣ as a suffix to the verb stem.
படு｢paṭu｣ is the verb stem for to sleep but in a sentence also means Sleep!. But this Sleep! is directed at a single person as படு｢paṭu｣ is only the imperative in singular.
படு｢paṭu｣ + உங்கள்｢uṅkaḷ｣ = படுங்கள்｢paṭuṅkaḷ｣ is the plural imperative. In English, you would still translate that as Sleep! but in Tamil you know that this addresses more than one person
As with the personal pronoun, the plural version of the imperative is also used for the honourable version.
Special Cases
There are a few exceptions to this rule. Most notably வரு｢varu｣ — come and போகு｢pōku｣ — go. The imperatives for those are வா｢vā｣ and வாருங்கள்｢vāruṅkaḷ｣ and போ｢pō｣ and போங்கள்｢pōṅkaḷ｣
Sentence structure
As with every other sentence in Tamil, the imperative clause also ends with the verb and can have all the same sub-clauses we learnt earlier in this book.
This sentence is the serial verb concept we learnt that is used to concatenate actions. In this case, in brings two instructions together.
படத்தை பார்த்து விட்டு｢paṭattai pārttu viṭṭu｣ after watching the movie
கட்டிலில் படு｢kaṭṭilil paṭu｣ sleep on the bed
The last, finite verb indicates that this sentence is an imperative clause.
Negative imperative
If you want to command or request something not to be done, you use the negative imperative. In our examples above, it's the
"Do not touch my hair"
There are two suffixes for the negative imperative: -ஆதே｢-ātē｣ for singular and -ஆதீர்கள்｢-ātīrkaḷ｣ for plural. Both at added to the verb stem. Like for the "positive" imperative, the plural form can also be used as the honorable variant.
தொடு｢toṭu｣ + ஆதே｢ātē｣ = தொடாதே｢toṭātē｣
தொடு｢toṭu｣ + ஆதீர்கள்｢ātīrkaḷ｣ = தொடாதீர்கள்｢toṭātīrkaḷ｣