Dumper takes a reference to "something", could be a scalar, an array or even an arbitrary complex data structure.

#!usr/bin/perl -w
use strict;
use Data::Dumper;

my $sql = "some string";
dbAction($sql, 55, 66);

sub dbAction  # DO NOT use a prototype!
{
   my (@inputs) = my ($sql, $parm1, $parm2) = @_;

   print Dumper (\@inputs);
   print Dumper (\@_);      #this works also
                            #but I would prefer to give
                            #the @_ inputs a name
                            #choice is yours
   print Dumper (\$sql, \$parm1, \$parm2);
   print Dumper (\$sql, \@inputs[1,2]);
}

__END__
prints:
$VAR1 = [
          'some string',
          55,
          66
        ];
$VAR1 = [
          'some string',
          55,
          66
        ];
$VAR1 = \'some string';
$VAR2 = \55;
$VAR3 = \66;
$VAR1 = \'some string';
$VAR2 = \55;
$VAR3 = \66;
[download]