Kota language (India)

Kota
Kō mānt
Native to India
Region Nilgiri Hills
Ethnicity 1,400 Kotas (2001 census?)[1]
Native speakers
 930 (2001 census)[2]
Language codes
ISO 639-3 kfe
Glottolog kota1263[3]

Kota is a language of the Dravidian language family with about 900 native speakers in the Nilgiri hills of Tamil Nadu state, India. It is spoken mainly by the tribal Kota people. In the late 19th century, the native speaking population was about 1,100.[4] In 1990, the population was only 930, out of an ethnic population of perhaps 1,400, despite the great increase in the population of the area.[2] The language is "critically endangered" due to the greater social status of neighboring languages.[5]

Phonology

Consonants [6]
Labial Dental Alveolar Retroflex Palatal Velar
Plosive voiceless p t̪ t ʈ c (t͡ʃ) k
voiced b d̪ d ɖ ɟ (d͡ʒ) ɡ
Nasal m n̪ ɳ ɲ
Approximant central ʋ j
lateral l m
Tap ɾ ɽ
Fricative ɳ

[ɳ] and [z] occur in free variation with /c (t͡ʃ)/ and /ɟ (d͡ʒ)/. [ʂ] occurs as an allophone of /ɳ/ before retroflexes.

References

  1. ↑ Kota language (India) at Ethnologue (17th ed., 2013)
  2. 1 2 Kota at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015)
  3. ↑ Nordhoff, Sebastian; Hammarström, Harald; Forkel, Robert; Haspelmath, Martin, eds. (2013). "Kota (India)". Glottolog. Leipzig: Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology.
  4. ↑ Caldwell, Robert. 1875. A Comparative Grammar of the Dravidian Or South-Indian Family of Languages. London: Trübner & Company
  5. ↑ Prema, Dr. S. n.d. "Status of Dravidian Tribal Languages in Kerala" University of Kerala
  6. ↑ Krishnamurti, Bhadriraju (2003). The Dravidian languages (null ed.). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. p. 53. ISBN 978-0-511-06037-3.

Further reading

External links

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