Koda, also known as Kora, Kaora, Korali, Korati, Kore, Mudi, or Mudikora, is an endangered Munda language of

India India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, seventh-largest country by area, the List of countries and dependencies by population, second-most populous ...

and

Bangladesh Bangladesh (}, ), officially the People's Republic of Bangladesh, is a country in South Asia. It is the eighth-most populous country in the world, with a population exceeding 165 million people in an area of . Bangladesh is among the mo ...

spoken by the Kora. The Kora mainly live in West Bengal, in the districts of

Paschim Medinipur Paschim Medinipur district or West Midnapore district (also known as Midnapore West) is one of the districts of the state of West Bengal, India. It was formed on 1 January 2002 after the Partition of Midnapore into Paschim Medinipur and Purba M ...

and

Bankura Bankura () is a city and a municipality in the state of West Bengal, India. It is the headquarters of the Bankura district. Etymology In the Mahabharata, Bankura was described as Suhmobhumi. The word or (in Nagari: rāḍh) was introduced ...

, with a few in neighbouring

Odisha Odisha (English: , ), formerly Orissa ( the official name until 2011), is an Indian state located in Eastern India. It is the 8th largest state by area, and the 11th largest by population. The state has the third largest population of ...

and

Jharkhand Jharkhand (; ; ) is a state in eastern India. The state shares its border with the states of West Bengal to the east, Chhattisgarh to the west, Uttar Pradesh to the northwest, Bihar to the north and Odisha to the south. It has an area of . I ...

. In 2005, there were 1,300 speakers in the

Rajshahi Division Rajshahi Division ( bn, রাজশাহী বিভাগ) is one of the eight first-level administrative divisions of Bangladesh. It has an area of and a population at the 2011 Census of 18,484,858. Rajshahi Division consists of 8 district ...

of Bangladesh, though many said that

Bengali Bengali or Bengalee, or Bengalese may refer to: *something of, from, or related to Bengal, a large region in South Asia * Bengalis, an ethnic and linguistic group of the region * Bengali language, the language they speak ** Bengali alphabet, the w ...

was their best language. Koda is closely related to the Kol language. Kim (2010) considers Koda and Kol to be Mundari cluster languages. Koda-speaking villages include Kundang and Krishnupur in

, Bangladesh, while Kol villages include Babudaing village. Koda verbs are inflected for tense-aspect-mood and person, number, finite/infinite, subject/object, possessor, animacy and transitivity. In recent times Koda is code-mixing with Bangla: including vocabulary replacement and greater adoption of Bengali syntax. These processes are seen more in younger speakers. Shamim (2021) presents a description of the phonology and morphology of Koda. It also presents a study of Koda in the context of language contact.

References

Munda languages Endangered languages of India {{AustroAsiatic-lang-stub Languages of Bangladesh