Central Bengali dialects


Central Bengali or Raṛhi Bengali is a dialect cluster of the Bengali language spoken in the West-Central part of Bengal, in and around the Bhagirathi River basin of Nadia district and other districts of the Presidency division in West Bengal, as well as the undivided Kushtia district region of western Bangladesh. Associated with the upper Delta and eastern Rarh region of Bengal, it forms the basis of the standard variety of Bengali.

Geographical boundaries

This dialect is prevalent in Central Bengal specifically in the West Bengal districts of Kolkata, Nadia, Howrah, Hooghly, and Purba Bardhaman. It is also spoken natively in the Chuadanga, Kushtia and Meherpur districts of Bangladesh, which were a part of the Nadia district prior to the 1947 Partition of India. Along with Eastern Bengali dialect, Modern Standard Bengali has been formed on the basis of this dialect.

Features

Phonology

  • Extensive use of Obhishruti. E.g. Beng. Koriya > Beng. Koira > Beng. Kore.
  • The change of অ to ও, when অ is the first sound of a word where the অ is followed by ই, ও, ক্ষ or য. E.g. Ati is pronounced as Oti.
  • Use of vowel harmony. E.g. Bilati became Biliti.
  • Most of the time, if the first sound of a word is 'n', it becomes 'l' and if it is 'l', it becomes 'n'. E.g. newa became lewa and lebu became nebu.
  • The Aspirated 'chh' at the after of a word is pronounced like not aspirated 'ch'. E.g Giyechhi became gechi.

    Morphology

  • The common standard Bengali plural affix 'gulô' is pronounced 'gunô' in the dialect, whereas it becomes 'gulā' or 'gulān' in eastern Bengali dialects.
  • The past first person affix lām in standard dialect becomes lum, or nu. E.g the word in standard dialect 'kôrlām' became kôrlum or kôrnu.
  • The 'go' suffix which is added to the singular genetive to form the genetive plural is also found in Rarhi dialect speaking areas but it is commonly used in Vanga dialects. E.g āmā-gô, tômā-gô.

    Obhishruti and Opinihiti

Ôbhishruti and Ôpinihiti are two phonological phenomena that occur in spoken Bengali dialects. Opinihiti refers to the phonological process in which a i or u is pronounced before it occurs in the word. Obhishruti is the sound change in which this shifted i or u becomes removed and changes the preceding vowel. Observe the example above : Koriya > Koirya > Kore. First Opinihiti changes Koriya to Koirya, then Obhishruti changes Koirya to Kore.