Dravidian is the sixth largest language family in the world and second in South Asia. The Kurux language, known as Oraon, belongs to the North Dravidian sub-branch. It is spoken in the Indian states of Jharkhand, Chhattisgarh, and Odissa. Unlike other South Dravidian non-literary languages, Kurux is in extensive contact with Indo-Aryan languages. However, Kurux has received less attention from either descriptive or comparative linguists than its sister languages. Consequently, the unique mixture of archaic Dravidian features and contact-induced innovation in Kurux is not represented in comparative studies of Dravidian languages. And contact-induced changes in Kurux have not received much attention in the literature on contact and convergence studies in the Indian linguistics area. Masato Kobayashi and Bablu Trikey's The Kurux Language: Grammar, Text, and Lexicon is a comprehensive grammar of Kurux which fills the gap and sets a standard model for the description of Dravidian languages. The introductory part gives a brief typological overview of the status, writing system, earlier studies, genetic relation, and contact-induced features of Kurux. The book consists of three main sections, the grammar (pp. 23–318), text (pp. 321–572), and a rich annotated Kurux–English dictionary (pp. 573–771).

Five vowels with their length and short and long nasalized pairs are identified with their distribution. Nasalized vowels are a distinct feature of Kurux within the Dravidian family. Based on close observation of the features of vowels, the most widespread sound change among the Dravidian umlaut is observed in Kurux as the later development, i.e. after it diverged from Malto (p. 32). The rich consonantal system (34 consonants) is described and the aspirated pairs of all voiceless and voiced stops are explained as contact-induced phonological enrichment. The glottal stop in Kurux is uncommon in Dravidian, with the exception of Kuvi: it is explained as the development which occurred after Kurux diverged from Proto-Kurux-Malto stage. Eleven phonological alternations are described, among them de-aspiration of loanwords and spontaneous aspiration, which are contact-induced changes observed in the major literary Dravidian languages that converged with Indo-Aryan, especially Malayalam and Telugu.

The typological shift of Kurux morphology from agglutinative to analytical is described as a contact-induced innovation. Against the general cross-linguistic trends of grammaticalization, it is observed that “If our analysis is right, Kurux is undergoing a cross-linguistically uncommon change of case suffix to postpositions” (p. 70). Comparison of Kurux with the cognate language Malto provides enough data to prove this typological shift in Kurux. The use of inter-female conjugation in the context of the speaker and addressees all being women is one of the unique features of Kurux. Parts of speech are described with ample data. The following distinct characteristics of Kurux morphology are revealed: (i) the presence of numeral classifier and plural demonstratives; (ii) two-suffix slot for case form, one for agreement and another for case suffix; (iii) use of reduplication to express exclusiveness, mutuality, and restrictive sense in pronouns; (iv) three-way deixis system of proximal, medial, and distal as in Old Tamil. Descriptive evidence of medial deixis from Kurux supports Bh. Krishnamurti's controversial reconstruction of Proto-Dravidian laryngeal phoneme *H. *H can be reconstructed from the proto Kurux-Malto *uH (90); (v) borrowing of Indo-Aryan adjective suffixes and numerals, unlike other Dravidian languages.

The syntactic structure of Kurux is described in detail (pp. 174–234). Description of the semantic structure of the language as an independent chapter is undoubtedly an advance in grammatical description in Dravidian. This is the first descriptive grammar of a Dravidian language with a dedicated description of semantics (pp. 235–98). Many aspects of syntax traditionally dealt with, like copular verb, possession, types of questions, deictic verb, definiteness, use of aspectual forms, modality, causative, and passive voice, are treated in this chapter. Different semantic functions of these aspects are discussed in detail beyond their structural aspects. For instance, the potential, permissive, adversative function of passive construction in Dravidian languages is described in detail.

The domain of lexicon is discussed in an independent chapter. Inherited etyma of the Kurux lexicon with different subgroups and 12 Dravidian languages have been examined and it is found that Kurux shares the largest number of cognates with Malto (72.7%), followed by Brahui (41.8%), etc. Representative sets of loan words from Indo-Aryan, English and Munda languages are described. The elaborate system of Kurux kinship including the affinal terms with personal names borrowed from Indo-Aryan has been dealt with. Expressives in Kurux are formed by whole or partial duplication. Repetition, e.g. kerme: kerme: “slowly”, combination with phonologically similar words, e.g. ujj-a: bijj-a: “to live”, combination of different words, e.g loha: -luti: “iron and so on”, are the different types of expressive. Further, six types of interjections, euphemistic expression and the names of fauna and flora are listed. It is interesting to note that Kurux has terms of address for eight domesticated animals: an adult buffalo is called manxa:, a young buffalo is called ka ɽ ru:; to direct it to come is a:x a:x and to say go to it hi:r.

Thirteen transliterated, glossed and translated texts are given (pp. 321–515). This will definitely constitute potential motivating data for future studies. A 191-page dictionary of Kurux is given in the order of Kurux word, grammatical category, the source of meaning and English equivalences. I am sure that this would challenge the South Dravidian centrism of Dravidian Etymological Dictionary Revised (DEDR).

Entry numbers could have been provided in the lexicon. The semantic section deals with the functional aspects of grammatical categories spread across morphology and syntax. These aspects in the semantic section could have been dealt with in a separate chapter on morpho-syntax. Therefore, the morpho-syntactic characters of Kurux, like any other Dravidian languages, would have been explained adequately as demonstrated by Subrahmanyam (2013). This grammar will definitely continue as a model work for many descriptive works of Dravidian languages yet to come, and Kurux is now placed in the mainstream of comparative Dravidian and contact studies.