Bengali phonology

The phonology of the Bengali language is, like that of its neighbouring Eastern Indo-Aryan languages, characterised by a wide variety of diphthongs and inherent back vowel (both /o/ and /ɔ/) instead of the schwa used by almost all other branches of the Indo-Aryan language family.

Phonemically, Bengali features 29 consonants and 14 or 15 vowels (Eastern dialects incorporate an additional vowel featured in a vowel harmony process), including seven nasalized vowels. In the tables below, the sounds are given in IPA.

Although the standard form of Bengali is largely uniform across West Bengal and Bangladesh, there are a few sounds that vary in pronunciation (in addition to the myriad variations in non-standard dialects):

The murmured series is missing in the Eastern Bengali of Dhaka and in Chittagong Bengali, where it is replaced by tone, as in Panjabi (Masica 1991:102).

Native Bengali (তদ্ভব tôdbhôbo) words do not allow initial consonant clusters; the maximum syllabic structure is CVC (i.e. one vowel flanked by a consonant on each side). Many speakers of Bengali restrict their phonology to this pattern, even when using Sanskrit or English borrowings, such as গেরাম geram (CV.CVC) for গ্রাম gram (CCVC) meaning 'village' or ইস্কুল iskul / ishkul (VC.CVC) for স্কুল skul (CCVC) 'school'.

Sanskrit (তৎসম tôtshômo) words borrowed into Bengali, however, possess a wide range of clusters, expanding the maximum syllable structure to CCCVC. Some of these clusters, such as the [mr] in মৃত্যু mrittü ('death') or the [sp] in স্পষ্ট spôshṭo ('clear'), have become extremely common, and can be considered permitted consonant clusters in Bengali. English and other foreign (বিদেশী bideshi) borrowings add even more cluster types into the Bengali inventory, further increasing the syllable capacity, as commonly-used loanwords such as ট্রেন ṭren ('train') and গ্লাস glash ('glass') are now included in leading Bengali dictionaries.

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