The Cochin Jews constitute one of the smallest Jewish communities in the world. They originate from the Malabar Coast in India and traditionally were divided into two caste-like subgroups: "White" (Paradesi) and "Black" (Malabari, although this entire group of Jews is from Malabar) Jews. The term "Paradesi" means "foreigner, " and the "White" Jews are the descendants of Spanish, Portuguese, Iraqi, and other Jews who arrived on the Malabar Coast from the sixteenth century on. The "White" community has all but disappeared; a total of fifteen Paradesi Jews resided in Kerala in 2001. Almost all of the "Black" community has been transplanted to Israel, where these people have integrated successfully into Israeli society. Less than forty Cochin Jews live in Kerala. The Cochin Jews, like their neighbors, speak Malayalam, a Dravidian language. In Israel they also speak modern Hebrew.
http://www.encyclopedia.com/topic/Cochin_Jew.aspx
Since the development of Malayalam as distinct from Tamil, Jews have used some variety of Malayalam as their everyday spoken language. The Jewish variety has differed by the use of Hebrew loanwords and Dravidian archaisms in lexicon, phonology, and syntax. And like most Jews around the world, Kerala Jews use Hebrew for liturgical purposes.
There has been very little research on Jewish varieties of Malayalam. The information in this description is based mostly on a corpus of about 200 songs written and sung by Jewish Malayalam-speaking women. These Jewish Malayalam folk songs (JMFS) were sung at life-cycle events and holiday celebrations, and they include many Jewish religious signifiers in the forms of biblical allusions and formulaic blessings and prayers. JMFS are currently under analysis by scholars of Indology, Jewish studies, and Malayalam studies as part of a project of the Ben-Zvi Institute of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. A pioneering volume of about 50 songs is due to be published in 2004 along with translations into Hebrew. A German translation of these songs (Frenz & Zacharia 2002) was already published, and a larger volume of English translations is under preparation. In addition, the Jewish Music Research Center of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem is producing a CD of JMFS.
One of the most notable features of Jewish Malayalam is the presence of fossilized elements from the pre-Malayalam layer. These archaisms exist at several levels, including lexicon, morphology, phonology, and semantics. A semantic example can be found in one of the wedding songs: the bride is described as covering her head with three types of flowers that have NaRRam. The word NaRRam exists in contemporary Tamil, Malayalam, and other local languages with the meaning 'bad smell'. However, in this case the word is used with its old Tamil sense: 'good smell'. This is just one example of the many elements of Jewish Malayalam that may seem like contemporary Tamil borrowings but are actually archaic remnants from before Malayalam split off from Tamil.
Another significant feature is the abundance of archaic Dravidian derivatives to denote Jewish concepts. The best examples are names for God, many of which are loan translations from Hebrew. Jews, Muslims, and Christians share the most popular form Thampuran 'Lord'. Jews and Muslims share Padachavan 'creator'. But Mulamudayon 'the one at the beginning', Oruvanayavan 'the only one', Sadakan 'the doer', Adimulamvayavan 'the one who is the root cause', and Adiperiyon 'the great beginner' are words for God used only by Jews. The typical Jewish concept of redemption is expressed by a special word coined from a Dravidian root "mil," according to well-accepted morphological rules: Milcha 'redemption' and Mirchakaran 'redeemer' are frequently found in JMFS but are non-existent in general Malayalam. JMFS are full of variants of these two Malayalam words, sometimes altered beyond recognition.
Because of the frequency of archaisms, an ordinary Malayalam speaker would be bewildered by the opaqueness of JMFS. Even the women who still sing these songs today may not understand some of the words they use. But the linguistic archaisms – as well as biblical allusions – contribute to the speakers' sense of ethno-religious distinctiveness.
Like Jewish languages around the world, Jewish Malayalam includes a number of Hebrew words and idioms, such as tora ('Torah'), shalom ('peace'), shir ('song'), and aliya ('ascension') . In a few instances Hebrew words appear as part of Malayalam compounds, such as alam padacavanthe 'world-created-he' and shalom ayi 'died' (lit. 'entered the state of peace').
Using only the JMFS corpus as data, it is difficult to determine how Jewish Malayalam differs phonologically from its non-Jewish correlate. It is written in Malayalam script, and the notebooks vary significantly in the graphemic representations of phonemes and allophonic distributions. This is especially true in the case of borrowed words from Sanskrit and Hebrew. In certain cases, the same Hebrew word is written in JMFS in three of four forms.
Even so, it is possible to determine one distinct phonological feature: the realization of hiatus between vowels. In general Malayalam, as well as other Dravidian languages, vowel continuum is prevented. In JMFS, however, it is allowed. The spoken Malayalam of Kerala Jews, as I understand from my short but intimate contact with them in Israel, is not syntactically different from that of Malayalam speakers in and around Cochin. But many of them hesitate to speak with me in Malayalam, apologizing for their 'Jewish Malayalam'. This may be explained in the context of traditional schooling in Kerala, which insisted on the heavily Sanskritized 'standard Malayalam'.
Since the majority of Jewish Malayalam speakers are elderly, the days of the language are numbered. In order to document the spoken language, scholars must act soon.
http://www.jewish-languages.org/jewish-malayalam.html