Irula language

Irula
இருளா
Native to	India
Region	Nilgiri Mountains
Ethnicity	Irula
Native speakers	11,870 (2011 census) Census conflates some speakers with Tamil
Language family	Dravidian South Dravidian Tamil–Kannada Irula–Muduga Irula
Writing system	Tamil script
Language codes
ISO 639-3	iru
Glottolog	irul1243
ELP	Irula

Irula is a Dravidian language spoken by the Irulas who inhabit the area of the Nilgiri mountains, in the states of Tamil Nadu, Kerala, and Karnataka, India. It is closely related to Tamil. It is written in the Tamil script.

Origins

The language was first described and classified by indologist Kamil Zvelebil, who in 1955 showed that the Irula language is an independent Southern Dravidian language that is akin to Tamil, particularly Old Tamil, with some Kannada-like features. Before that, it was traditionally denied or put to doubt, and Irula was described as a crude or corrupt mixture of Tamil and Kannada.

According to a tentative hypothesis by Kamil Zvelebil, a pre-Dravidian Melanid population that forms the bulk of the Irulas anthropologically began to speak an ancient pre- or proto-Tamil dialect, which was superimposed almost totally on their native (pre-Dravidian) speech. That then became the basis of the language, which must have subsequently been in close contact with the other tribal languages of the Nilgiri area as well as with the large surrounding languages such as Kannada, Tamil, and Malayalam.

Phonology

The tables present the vowel and the consonant phonemes of Irula.

Vowels

	Front		Central				Back
	short	long	short	long	short	long	short	long
High	i	iː	ɨ	ɨː	ʉ	ʉː	u	uː
Mid	e	eː	ə	əː	ɵ	ɵː	o	oː
Low			a	aː

Zvelebil and Perialwar had listed centralized <ä, ǟ> before in the phonology. The real quality distinguishing <ä, ǟ> and <a, ā> isn't clear.

Consonants

		Labial	Dental	Alveolar	Retroflex	Post-alv./ Palatal	Velar
Nasal		m		n	ɳ
Stop	voiceless	p	t̪	t	ʈ	t͡ʃ	k
	voiced	b	d̪	d	ɖ	d͡ʒ	ɡ
Fricative				s
Approx.	central	ʋ				j
	lateral			l	ɭ
Rhotic				ɾ, r	ɽ

• It isn't clear how /d/ and /r/ are different phonemes.

Sources

• Krishnamurti, Bhadriraju (2003), The Dravidian Languages, Cambridge University Press, ISBN 0-521-77111-0
• Perialwar, R. (1978), A Grammar of Irula, Annamalai University
• Perialwar, R. (1979), Phonology of Irula with Vocabulary, Annamalai University
• Zvelebil, Kamil V. (2001), "Irula Phonological System", Nilgiri Areal Studies, Charles University in Prague, Karolinum Press, ISBN 80-7184-945-6

Further reading

• Zvelebil, Kamil (1973), The Irula language, Volumes 1-3, Harrassowitz, ISBN 978-3-447-01520-2