This article is about the northern Kerala variety of Malayalam language. For the Arabic script used for writing Malayalam language, see Arabi Malayalam.
Mappila dialect (formerly Moplah Malayalam) is a variety of Malayalam, a language with a distinct modern diglossia, spoken predominantly by the Muslim Mappila community of Kerala, southern India. The Mappila form can be classified as a regional dialect in northern Kerala, or as a class or occupational dialect of the Mappila community. The Mappila dialect can also called as a vernacular in general, or as a provincial patois, with the latter label being increasingly applicable in Colonial times. All the forms of the Malayalam language, including Mappila, are mutually intelligible.[1][2]
The Mappila form show some lexical (vocabulary) admixture from Arabic and Persian.[2][3]
The variety is also used by lower caste non-Muslims in northern Kerala, Muslims in Dakshina Kannada, and different Mappila migrant communities in South East Asia.[4]
References
^Subramoniam, V. I. (1997). Dravidian Encyclopaedia. Vol. 3, Language and literature. Thiruvananthapuram (Kerala): International School of Dravidian Linguistics. pp. 508-09. [1]
^Krishna Chaitanya. Kerala. India, the Land and the People. New Delhi: National Book Trust, India, 1994. [2]
^Upadhyaya, U. Padmanabha. Coastal Karnataka: Studies in Folkloristic and Linguistic Traditions of Dakshina Kannada Region of the Western Coast of India. Udupi: Rashtrakavi Govind Pai Samshodhana Kendra, 1996. pp. 63-83.
