Phonotactics and Syllable structure of Balochi Language: A case of Makurani dialect

Abstract

- As far as phonology is concerned, it is the study of sound system of a specific language like the sounds which form the phonemic inventory of a specific language. Further, phonologists are concerned with the formation of cluster and the position of sounds in a syllable, they define how some sounds are possible and others impossible in a syllable structure, this is known as phonotactics. Phonologists discover such constraints and, on the basis, they differentiate the syllable structure of one language from others. This research was aimed at exploring the syllable structures of Makurani dialect of Balochi language. In this case, the data was collected through a word list. The word list was prepared by the researcher with the help of the language speakers. In order to know the possible syllable structures, the participants were given the word list and were asked to pronounce them. Simultaneously, the data was tape-recorded and the words were syllabified in phonetic transcription. Moreover, another interesting feature of the dialect was that its phonotactic constraints do not allow /h/ as an onset phoneme. Therefore, the speakers were observed to have left the phoneme
unpronounced.