A Sociolinguistic Profile of Kurumba Dialects

The purposes of this survey conducted in 1986/87 were (1) To discover the location and population of communities which use Kannada dialects as the traditional mother tongue and which have immigrated to the northern and western districts of Tamil Nadu. (2) To determine the degree of linguistic similarity among the vocabularies of the various Kannada dialects used in Tamil Nadu and the degree of linguistic similarity of those dialect to the various major languages. (3) To find the degree of inherent intelligibility among the Kannada dialects used by the various communities. (4) To investigate the extent of bilingualism in the traditional Kannada communities, particularly with reference to Tamil, but also such other majority languages as may be necessary. (5) To investigate language use and language attitudes in Kannada-speaking communities.

[This old report is published without peer review for its historical value. ed.]