Kasaragodu Malayalam - i

I spoke my mother tongue Malayalam until I was 4 years old (according to my mother) then switched to Kannada. The legacy of which could be seen in the fact that I can speak with kids below four years old only in Malayalam and also with all animals (Need not be universal truth as my born Kannadiga brother also has the same habit). Of course, it can be also said that the four years threshold is in place because the children above that age have the language skills that exceed mine (in Malayalam).

After the birth of my daughter I have this dilemma whether my natural instincts to speak in Malayalam to babies should be given free run or should be curtailed. I have recently read that if the kids are bilingual before the age of five their communication skills would be hampered as they grow up. Strictly speaking, I wasn't bilingual when I reached the age of five. I switched from one language to another thus I was a serial monolingual. But I was never satisfied with my grasp over any languages that I can read, write and speak (Kannada, English, Hindi, Tulu and Malayalam). So, I thought of speaking with my daughter in Malayalam until she becomes five years old.

However, my wife read somewhere that bilinguals have better chances avoiding Alzheimer's. She thought it would be better if we turned our daughter bilingual. So, I switched over to Kannada with my daughter. But here comes the problem.

Kannada, as I learnt it, is bookish or standard dialect. I am observing it's not best suited to speak with babies. Malayalam, be it standard dialect or Kasaragodu dialect, is an amazing short cut language. I suppose the late standardization of the language has removed many agglutinations/suffixes from Malayalam and is closer to spoken dialects. I do know many of the Kannada spoken dialects have shorter morphology. However, the early standardization has left the standard dialect with long agglutinations. I think there was a recent survey (in Outlook Magazine I suppose) where it was reported that Malayalis have the best grasp over the standard language and Kannadigas the worst among primary school students in South India. Probably, gulf between standard language and spoken language explains this difference between Malayalis and Kannadigas.