Paper short abstract:

Indo-Portuguese, the generic term to denote the Portuguese-lexified creoles of South Asia, has a long and important history in India and Sri Lanka, and subsists in some locations with variable degrees of vitality. In this talk, we will zoom in on South India, where the rise and fall of Indo-Portuguese were particularly dramatic – from extremely widespread up to the late 19th-century to extinct (with a single known exception) nowadays.

Paper long abstract:

Indo-Portuguese, the generic term to denote the Portuguese-lexified creoles of South Asia, has a long and important history in India and Sri Lanka, and subsists in some locations with variable degrees of vitality. Out of all the geolinguistic settings in which Indo-Portuguese creoles formed, in this talk we will zoom in on South India, a region where the rise and fall of Indo-Portuguese were particularly dramatic - from extremely widespread up to the late 19th-century to extinct (with the single known exception of a small pocket in Cannanore [Kannur]) nowadays. Based on historical-archival evidence and oral histories recently collected in Kerala and Tamil Nadu, we will characterise the past geographical and social implantation of Indo-Portuguese in South India, map its demise, and identify the reported reasons underlying its rapid contraction. What emerges is a history of obsolescence which to a large extent mirrors that of other endangered or extinct languages the world over - reflecting e.g. social restructuring, and changes in the region's political, economic and religious dynamics - but also with some specificities, in which ideological notions of (in)correctness, hybridisation and colonial associations take centre-stage.