The Dravidian languages are a family of languages spoken by 250 million people, mainly in southern India, north-east Sri Lanka, and south-west Pakistan, with pockets elsewhere in South Asia.
Malayalam is a Dravidian language spoken in the Indian state of Kerala and the union territories of Lakshadweep and Puducherry by the Malayali people. It is one of 22 scheduled languages of India. Malayalam was designated a "Classical Language of India" in 2013. Malayalam has official language status in Kerala, Lakshadweep and Puducherry (Mahé), and is also the primary spoken language of Lakshadweep and is spoken by 35 million people in India. Malayalam is also spoken by linguistic minorities in the neighbouring states; with a significant number of speakers in the Kodagu and Dakshina Kannada districts of Karnataka, and Kanyakumari, Coimbatore and Nilgiris district of Tamil Nadu. It is also spoken by the Malayali Diaspora worldwide, especially in the Persian Gulf countries, due to the large populations of Malayali expatriates there. They are a significant population in each city in India including Mumbai, Bengaluru, Chennai, Delhi, Hyderabad etc.
Cochin Jews are the oldest group of Jews in India, with roots that are claimed to date back to the time of King Solomon. The Cochin Jews settled in the Kingdom of Cochin in South India, now part of the present-day state of Kerala. As early as the 12th century, mention is made of the Jews in southern India by Benjamin of Tudela.
Portuguese creoles are creole languages which have Portuguese as their substantial lexifier. The most widely-spoken creoles influenced by Portuguese are Cape Verdean Creole, Guinea-Bissau Creole and Papiamento.
Macanese patois is a Portuguese-based creole language with a substrate from Cantonese, Malay and Sinhala, which was originally spoken by the Macanese community of the Portuguese colony of Macau. It is now spoken by a few families in Macau and in the Macanese diaspora.
Konkani is an Indo-Aryan language spoken by the Konkani people, primarily in the Konkan region, along the western coast of India. It is one of the 22 scheduled languages mentioned in the Indian Constitution, and the official language of the Indian state of Goa. It is also spoken in Karnataka, Maharashtra, Kerala, Gujarat as well as Damaon, Diu & Silvassa.
The Kingdom of Cochin, also known as the Kingdom of Kochi or later as Cochin State, named after its capital in the city of Kochi (Cochin), was an Indian Hindu kingdom in the central part of present-day Kerala state. It commenced at the early part of the 12th century and continued to rule until its accession to the Dominion of India in 1949.
Language contact occurs when speakers of two or more languages or varieties interact with and influence each other. The study of language contact is called contact linguistics. Language contact can occur at language borders, between adstratum languages, or as the result of migration, with an intrusive language acting as either a superstratum or a substratum.
Judeo-Malayalam is the traditional language of the Cochin Jews, from Kerala, in southern India, spoken today by a few dozens of people in Israel and by probably fewer than 25 in India.
Sri Lanka Indo-Portuguese, Ceylonese Portuguese Creole or Sri Lankan Portuguese Creole (SLPC) is a language spoken in Sri Lanka. While the predominant languages of the island are Sinhala and Tamil, the interaction of the Portuguese and the Sri Lankans led to the evolution of a new language, Sri Lanka Portuguese Creole (SLPC), which flourished as a lingua franca on the island for over 350 years (16th to mid-19th centuries). SLPC continues to be spoken by an unknown number of Sri Lankans, estimated to be extremely small.
Vypin is one of the group of islands that form part of the city of Kochi (Cochin), in the Indian state of Kerala. Vypin forms a barrier island which lies between the Arabian Sea in the west and the Cochin backwaters formed by the various distributaries of Periyar river, in the east. The northernmost end of the island lies on the estuary of the Periyar river in Muziris (Kodungallur), and the southernmost end in the mouth of the Cochin Backwaters in Kalamukku near Fort Vypin.
The Marakkars are a South Asian Muslim community found in parts of the Indian states of Kerala, Tamil Nadu, and Sri Lanka. The Marakkars speak Malayalam in Kerala and Tamil in Tamil Nadu and both Tamil and Sinhala in Sri Lanka.
Macanese Portuguese is a Portuguese dialect spoken in Macau, where Portuguese is co-official with Cantonese. Macanese Portuguese is spoken, to some degree either natively or as a second language, by roughly 2.3% of the population of Macau. It should not be confused with Macanese language, a distinct Portuguese creole that developed in Macau during the Portuguese rule.
The population of Kerala, India is a heterogenous group that comprises many ethnic groups that originated in other parts of India as well as the world, with distinctive cultural and religious traditions. While the majority of Keralites speak the Malayalam language, various ethnic groups may speak other languages as well.
Canarese Konkani are a set of dialects spoken by minority Konkani people of the Canara sub-region of Karnataka, and also in Kassergode of Kerala that was part of South Canara.
Dutch Malabar also known by the name of its main settlement Cochin, were a collection of settlements and trading factories of the Dutch East India Company on the Malabar Coast between 1661 and 1795, and was a subdivision of what was collectively referred to as Dutch India. Dutch presence in the Malabar region started with the capture of Portuguese Quilon, expanded with the Conquest of Malabar (1658-1663), and ended with the conquest of Malabar by the British in 1795. They possessed military outposts in 11 locations: Alleppey, Ayacotta, Chendamangalam, Pappinivattom, Ponnani, Pallipuram, Cranganore, Chetwai, Cannanore, Cochin, and Quilon.
Luso-Indians or Portuguese-Indian, is a subgroup of the larger Eurasian multiracial ethnic creole people of Luso-Asians. Luso-Indians are people who have mixed Indian and Portuguese ancestry or people of Portuguese descent born or living or originating in former Portuguese Indian colonies, the most important of which were Goa and Damaon of the Konkan region in the present-day Republic of India, and their diaspora around the world, the Anglosphere, Lusosphere, the Portuguese East Indies such as Macao etc.
Cannanore Indo-Portuguese is an Indo-Portuguese creole spoken on the Malabar coast of India. It formed from contact between the Portuguese and Malayalam languages in Indo-Portuguese households in the city of Kannur. In 2010 it was estimated to have five native speakers remaining. But there are around twenty or more who are dispersed in India and other parts of the world. It could have formed after the Cochin Indo-Portuguese.
The Latin Catholics of Malabar Coast, also known as Malabar Latin Catholics or Latin Christians of Kerala are a multi-ethnic religious group in Kerala adhering to the Roman Rite liturgical practices of the Latin Church, on the Malabar Coast, the southwestern coast of India. Ecclesiastically, they constitute the ecclesiastical provinces of Verapoly and Trivandrum. They are predominantly Malayali people and speak the Malayalam language, though a subgroup of Luso-Indians speaks the Cochin Portuguese Creole. They trace their origins to the evangelization of Malabar Coast by the Dominican, Franciscan, Jesuit and Carmelite missionaries, mainly French and Portuguese.
