{"id":375579,"date":"2026-11-13T15:43:19","date_gmt":"2026-11-13T10:13:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/?p=375579"},"modified":"2026-11-13T15:43:19","modified_gmt":"2026-11-13T10:13:19","slug":"kurumba-community-and-kurumba-language","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/kurumba-community-and-kurumba-language\/","title":{"rendered":"Kurumba Community and Kurumba Language"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"content-box-green\">\n<p><strong>News:<\/strong> The Kurumba community of Attappady, Kerala, is facing the gradual decline of its traditional Kurumba Language, highlighting the need to protect endangered tribal languages and preserve India&#8217;s linguistic diversity.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<h2 class=\"red-h2-box\">About Kurumba Community and Kurumba Language<\/h2>\n<figure id=\"attachment_375600\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-375600\" style=\"width: 300px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-375600\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/11\/Source-AIR-2.jpg?resize=300%2C152&#038;ssl=1\" alt=\"Kurumba Community and Kurumba Language\" width=\"300\" height=\"152\" srcset=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/11\/Source-AIR-2.jpg?resize=300%2C152&amp;ssl=1 300w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/11\/Source-AIR-2.jpg?resize=1024%2C519&amp;ssl=1 1024w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/11\/Source-AIR-2.jpg?resize=768%2C389&amp;ssl=1 768w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/11\/Source-AIR-2.jpg?resize=1536%2C779&amp;ssl=1 1536w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/11\/Source-AIR-2.jpg?resize=1568%2C795&amp;ssl=1 1568w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/11\/Source-AIR-2.jpg?w=1576&amp;ssl=1 1576w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-375600\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Source &#8211; AIR<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<ul>\n<li>The <strong>Kurumbas<\/strong> of <strong>Keralam<\/strong> are an <strong>Adivasi community<\/strong> who reside in the<strong> hilly forest regions of Attappady in Palakkad district in Kerala.<\/strong>\n<ul>\n<li>These communities are <strong>also found<\/strong> in <strong class=\"rQesXe MPyX\" data-sfc-cp=\"\" data-sfc-root=\"c\">Tamil Nadu<\/strong> (especially the <strong>Nilgiris<\/strong>), and <strong class=\"rQesXe MPyX\" data-sfc-cp=\"\" data-sfc-root=\"c\">Karnataka.<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li><strong>Classification:<\/strong> The community has been classified as a Particularly Vulnerable Tribal Group <strong>(PVTG) by the Ministry of Tribal Affairs<\/strong>.\n<ul>\n<li>They are <strong>one of the five PVTGs in Keralam.<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li><strong>Culture:<\/strong>\u00a0They worship<strong> nature, <\/strong>including the earth, mountains and rivers, and<strong> honour their gods<\/strong> and <strong>ancestors<\/strong> through <strong>tribal ceremonies<\/strong>.\n<ul>\n<li>Their deities are <strong>represented by wooden or stone sculptures<\/strong> placed in small <strong>huts<\/strong> called <strong>\u2018Kaavu\u2019 (temples).<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li><strong>Festivals:<\/strong> The important festivals related to the<strong> devotion of deities<\/strong> are <strong>Malleeshwaran Shivarathri and Maariyamman pooja<\/strong><\/li>\n<li><strong>Population:<\/strong> Their population was only <strong>2,719 in 2024<\/strong>.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Languges:<\/strong> Kurumba Language\u00a0is the<strong> primary language of communication among the Kurumba people.<\/strong>\n<ul>\n<li>It is <strong> an oral language with no script<\/strong><\/li>\n<li>It is a<strong> group of languages within the Southern Dravidian branch<\/strong> of the <strong>Dravidian language family.<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li><strong>Threats to the Kurumba Language<\/strong>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Migration:<\/strong> Many Kurumba people<strong> migrate to nearby areas for education and employment.<\/strong> Limited schooling opportunities in their areas <strong>encourage migration and language shift.<\/strong><\/li>\n<li><strong>Influence of Malayalam:<\/strong> They<strong> increasingly adopt Malayalam<\/strong> to communicate with other communities.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Declining use: Younger generations are using Malayalam words<\/strong> instead of traditional Kurumba words.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Risk of Language Extinction: Languages with fewer than 10,000 speakers are grouped under &#8216;Others&#8217;<\/strong> in the Census, reducing their recognition and visibility and potentially underrepresenting India&#8217;s linguistic diversity.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li><strong>Effort for language preservation:<\/strong> <strong>Th<a href=\"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/scheme-for-protection-and-preservation-of-endangered-languages-of-india-sppel-to-promote-all-indian-languages-including-endangered-languages\/\">e Scheme for<\/a><a href=\"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/scheme-for-protection-and-preservation-of-endangered-languages-of-india-sppel-to-promote-all-indian-languages-including-endangered-languages\/\"> Protection and Preservation of Endangered Languages (SPPEL)<\/a>, <\/strong>implemented by the<strong> Central Institute of Indian Languages (CIIL)<\/strong> under the Government of India, includes Kurumba among the endangered languages targeted for systematic documentation.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>News: The Kurumba community of Attappady, Kerala, is facing the gradual decline of its traditional Kurumba Language, highlighting the need to protect endangered tribal languages and preserve India&#8217;s linguistic diversity. About Kurumba Community and Kurumba Language The Kurumbas of Keralam are an Adivasi community who reside in the hilly forest regions of Attappady in Palakkad&hellip; <a class=\"more-link\" href=\"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/kurumba-community-and-kurumba-language\/\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">Kurumba Community and Kurumba Language<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10366,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1566,1760,11212,12039],"tags":[11872,10498],"class_list":["post-375579","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-daily-factly-articles","category-polity-and-nation","category-history-and-art-culture-in-news","category-knolls","tag-9pm-daily-factly","tag-the-hindu","entry"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","views":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/375579","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10366"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=375579"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/375579\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=375579"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=375579"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=375579"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}