KANNADA LANGUAGE

also spelled Kannada, also called Kanarese, language of the Dravidian family, spoken in southwestern India; it is the official language of Karnataka (formerly Mysore) state. There are a number of regional dialects of Kannada and at least three distinct social dialects (Brahman, non-Brahman, and Harijan [Untouchable]). A dichotomy, called diglossia, also exists between the formal, literary language and the informal, colloquial language. The language uses retroflex consonants (e.g., t, d, n; sounds pronounced with the tip of the tongue curled back against the roof of the mouth), a typical Dravidian characteristic; and it indicates such grammatical categories as tense, number, person, and case with suffixes. The alphabet of Kannada is closely related to that of the Telugu language (q.v.).