The Koraga Alphabet

Koraga ^[1] (ISO 639-3: kfd) is a critically endangered South Dravidian language spoken by the Koraga tribal community of coastal Karnataka and Kerala, India.

The CIIL documents Koraga as a distinct South Dravidian language, though with very few remaining speakers due to language shift toward Tulu and Kannada.

The Koraga people are a Scheduled Tribe community of coastal Karnataka who have historically faced significant social marginalisation.

Koraga ^[2] is spoken in Dakshina Kannada and Udupi districts of coastal Karnataka, and in Kasaragod district of Kerala.

The Endangered Languages Project records the speaker community as very small and concentrated in these coastal districts.

The Koraga people historically lived in forested coastal areas, but land changes and settlement patterns have shifted many Koraga families into urban and semi-urban settings where language shift accelerates.

Koraga ^[1] and Tulu are both South Dravidian languages spoken in coastal Karnataka, but they are genetically distinct. Tulu belongs to the South Dravidian II subgroup, while Koraga's precise position within South Dravidian is documented by the CIIL as distinct.

However, extensive contact between the Koraga and Tuluva communities has resulted in significant Tulu influence on Koraga phonology and vocabulary.

This contact influence has contributed to the language shift away from Koraga toward Tulu — a key factor in Koraga's critical endangerment.

Koraga ^[1] belongs to the South Dravidian branch of the Dravidian language family. The CIIL documents Koraga as a distinct South Dravidian language, though its precise subgroup position within South Dravidian is discussed in linguistic literature.

Koraga shares genetic membership in South Dravidian with Tamil, Malayalam, Kannada and Tulu.

Geographically, Koraga is closest to the Tulu-speaking community of coastal Karnataka, making Tulu the dominant contact language for the Koraga community.

Koraga ^[1] is critically endangered, with very few fluent speakers remaining. The CIIL documents language shift toward Tulu and Kannada as the dominant pattern across Koraga communities.

The historically marginalised social position of the Koraga people — as a Scheduled Tribe with limited access to land, education and economic resources — has accelerated the shift away from Koraga.

Community-level transmission of the language to younger generations is extremely limited, making Koraga one of the most urgently endangered Dravidian languages.

Koraga ^[1] has an 8-vowel system with four short/long pairs (a/aa, i/ii, u/uu) plus mid vowels e and o, and 20 consonants including the Dravidian retroflex series (ṭ, ḍ, ṇ, ḷ).

The CIIL documents Koraga phonology as showing influence from Tulu — its dominant neighbour — in some phonological features.

Vowel length is phonemically distinctive in Koraga, and the retroflex consonants are among the defining features of its Dravidian heritage.

Koraga ^[1] has no traditional indigenous writing system. Academic and CIIL documentation uses Latin-script transcription with diacritics for retroflex consonants (ṭ, ḍ, ṇ, ḷ).

Some community literacy materials have used the Kannada script, reflecting the broader Karnataka administrative and educational environment.

Given the critically endangered status of the language, the development of educational and literacy materials is an urgent priority for preservation efforts.

The Koraga people ^[1] are a Scheduled Tribe community of coastal Karnataka — one of the historically marginalised communities of the Dakshina Kannada and Udupi districts.

The CIIL documents the Koraga as a distinct community that historically held a low social position in the coastal Karnataka social hierarchy, working as agricultural labourers and basket-weavers.

This social marginalisation has contributed to language shift, as Koraga families have increasingly adopted Tulu and Kannada to access education and economic opportunities.