Kokborok, also Tripuri, is language of the Bodo

Bodo languages

The Bodo languages are a small subfamily of the Bodo–Garo languages, a group of Tibeto-Burman languages spoken in eastern India, eastern Nepal, and Bangladesh. The term "Bodo languages" is also sometimes used to refer to the Bodo–Garo family as a whole....

 branch of the Tibeto-Burman language family. It is an official language of Tripura

Tripura

Tripura is a state in North-East India, with an area of . It is the third smallest state of India, according to area. Tripura is surrounded by Bangladesh on the north, south, and west. The Indian states of Assam and Mizoram lie to the east. The capital is Agartala and the main languages spoken are...

, a state of India

India

India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...

.

Syntax

The principal structures of affirmative

Affirmative

Affirmative can mean:*Pertaining to truth*Pertaining to an assertion*An answer that shows agreement or acceptance: see yes*Affirmative , the team which affirms the resolution*Affirmative action...

 sentences in Kokborok are the following:

a) Subject	Complement
Naisok	chwrai kaham.
(Naisok)	(boy good).
Naisok is a good boy.

b) Subject	Object	Verb
Naisok	mai	chao.
(Naisok)	(rice)	(eat).
Naisok eats rice.

c) Possessive	Subject	Question
Nini	mung	tamo?
(Your)	(name)	(what)
What is your name?

d) Subject	Question	Verb
Nwng	tamoni bagwi	phai?
(You)	(what for)	(come)
Why have you come?

e) Subject	Verb and Question
Nwng	thangnaide?
(You)	(will go)
Will you go?

f) Subject	Verb and Command
Nwng	thangdi.
(You)	(go)
You go.

Person

In Kokborok grammar use of the notion of 'person'

Grammatical person

Grammatical person, in linguistics, is deictic reference to a participant in an event; such as the speaker, the addressee, or others. Grammatical person typically defines a language's set of personal pronouns...

 is almost absent; the form of verb is same for one who speaks, one who is spoken to, and one who is spoken about.

Number

In Kokborok there are two numbers

Grammatical number

In linguistics, grammatical number is a grammatical category of nouns, pronouns, and adjective and verb agreement that expresses count distinctions ....

: Singular and plural. The plural marker is used at the end of the noun or pronoun. There are two plural markers: rok and song. Rok is universally used while song is used with human nouns only.
The plural marker is normally used at the end of the noun or pronoun. But when the noun has an adjective the plural marker is used at the end of the adjective instead of the noun.

Examples:

• Bwrwirok Teliamura o thangnai. These women will go to Teliamura.

• O bwrwi naithokrok kaham rwchabo. These beautiful women sing very well.

Gender

In Kokborok there are four genders

Grammatical gender

Grammatical gender is defined linguistically as a system of classes of nouns which trigger specific types of inflections in associated words, such as adjectives, verbs and others. For a system of noun classes to be a gender system, every noun must belong to one of the classes and there should be...

: masculine gender, feminine gender, common gender, and neuter gender. Words which denote male are masculine, words which denote female are feminine, words which can be both male and female are common gender, and words which cannot be either masculine or feminine and neuter gender.

Gender examples

borok	man - masculine
bwrwi	woman - feminine
chwrai	child - common
buphang	tree - neuter

There are various ways to change genders of words:

Using different words

bwsai	husband	bihik	wife
phayung	brother	hanok	sister
kiching	male friend	mare	female friend

Adding in at the end of the masculine word

sikla	young man	sikli	young woman
achu	grandfather	achui	grandmother
When the masculine words ends in a, the a is dropped.

Adding jwk at the end of the masculine word

bwsa	son	bwsajwk	daughter
kwra	father-in-law	kwrajwk	mother-in-law

Words of common gender are made masculine by adding suffixes, like sa, chwla, jua and feminine by adding ma, jwk, bwrwi

pun	goat	punjua	he goat	punjuk	she goat
tok	fowl	tokchwla	cock	tokma	hen
takhum	swan	takhumchwla	drake	takhumbwrwi	duck

Case and case endings

In Kokborok there are the nominative, accusative, instrumental, ablative, locative and possessive cases

Grammatical case

In grammar, the case of a noun or pronoun is an inflectional form that indicates its grammatical function in a phrase, clause, or sentence. For example, a pronoun may play the role of subject , of direct object , or of possessor...

.

Case suffixes

Nominative	o
Accusative	no
Instrumental Instrumental case The instrumental case is a grammatical case used to indicate that a noun is the instrument or means by or with which the subject achieves or accomplishes an action...	hai
Ablative	ni
Locative	o
Possessive Possessive case The possessive case of a language is a grammatical case used to indicate a relationship of possession. It is not the same as the genitive case, which can express a wider range of relationships, though the two have similar meanings in many languages.See Possession for a survey of the different...	ni

These case suffixes are used at the end of the noun/pronoun and there is no change in the form of the noun.

Adjective

In Kokborok the adjective

Adjective

In grammar, an adjective is a 'describing' word; the main syntactic role of which is to qualify a noun or noun phrase, giving more information about the object signified....

s come after the words they qualify. This rule is strictly followed only in the case of native adjectives. In case of loan adjectives the rule is rather loose. Kokborok adjectives may be divided into four classes:

1. pure adjectives
2. compound adjectives
3. verbal adjectives
4. K-adjectives

The first three classes may include both native and loan words. The fourth class is made of purely native words.
e.g.:

1. hilik - heavy, heleng - light
2. bwkha kotor - (heart big) - brave, bwkha kusu - (heart small) - timid
3. leng - tire, lengjak - tired, ruk - to boil, rukjak - boiled.
4. kaham - good, kotor - big, kisi - wet.

Numerals

Kokborok numeral

Number names

In linguistics, number names are specific words in a natural language that represent numbers.In writing, numerals are symbols also representing numbers...

s are both decimal

Decimal

The decimal numeral system has ten as its base. It is the numerical base most widely used by modern civilizations....

 and vigesimal

Vigesimal

The vigesimal or base 20 numeral system is based on twenty .- Places :...

.
sa, nwi, tham, brwi, ba, dok, sni, char, chuku, chi

rasa - hundred, saisa - thousand, rwjag - a lakh

Lakh

A lakh is a unit in the Indian numbering system equal to one hundred thousand . It is widely used both in official and other contexts in Pakistan, Bangladesh, India, Maldives, Nepal, Sri Lanka, Myanmar and is often used in Indian English.-Usage:...

A numeral is organised as:

chisa = chi + sa = ten + one = 11.

See also

• Kokborok
• Tripuri language
• Chinese language
  Chinese language
  The Chinese language is a language or language family consisting of varieties which are mutually intelligible to varying degrees. Originally the indigenous languages spoken by the Han Chinese in China, it forms one of the branches of Sino-Tibetan family of languages...
  
  
• Burmese language
  Burmese language
  The Burmese language is the official language of Burma. Although the constitution officially recognizes it as the Myanmar language, most English speakers continue to refer to the language as Burmese. Burmese is the native language of the Bamar and related sub-ethnic groups of the Bamar, as well as...
  
  
• Languages of India
  Languages of India
  The languages of India belong to several language families, the major ones being the Indo-European languages—Indo-Aryan and the Dravidian languages...