Tulu

Tulu belongs to the Dravidian language family, specifically classified within the South Dravidian branch.

Speakers

According to the 2011 Census of India, there are approximately 1,846,427 native Tulu speakers in India.

Distribution in India

Tulu is principally spoken in the southwestern coastal region of India, a belt traditionally referred to as Tulu Nadu. This region primarily encompasses the Dakshina Kannada and Udupi districts in the state of Karnataka, as well as the northern part of the Kasaragod district in Kerala.

Major grammatical features

• Phonology: Tulu possesses a typical Dravidian phonemic inventory, including a series of retroflex consonants (/ʈ/, /ɖ/, /ɳ/, /ɭ/). It is highly notable for its vowel system, which includes the close back unrounded vowel (/ɯ/) in addition to the close back rounded vowel (/u/).
• Morphology: Highly agglutinative. Nouns are marked for number (singular and plural) and decline for several cases, including nominative, accusative, dative, genitive, locative, and instrumental/sociative. Tulu distinguishes three grammatical genders in the singular (masculine, feminine, and neuter), though the masculine and feminine collapse into a common "rational" class in the plural. Verbs conjugate for tense (past, present, future), mood, and person-number-gender agreement.
• Syntax: Tulu strictly adheres to a Subject-Object-Verb (SOV) default word order. It is a left-branching language, meaning modifiers and relative clauses typically precede their head nouns, and postpositions are used instead of prepositions.

Further reading

• Learn more about the language's history, dialects, and writing systems on the Tulu language Wikipedia page.