Coarticulation in Pahari

Abstract

Coarticulation is a process in which the movements of different articulators affect each other, bringing a change either in the preceding or the following phonemes. As systematic linguistic study of regional languages in the state of AJ&K has not yet gained much importance, therefore, such phenomenon remained unexplored. The paper is an attempt to bring into focus the phenomenon of coarticulation in Pahari, a sister language of Urdu, spoken in the vicinity of Rawalakot. The paper focuses on two very common consequences of coarticulation i.e. assimilation and elision. More specifically, it addresses the issue of vocalic (vowel) assimilation at the lexical level while the process of elision both at the linguistic as well as post-lexical level for the above-mentioned dialect of Pahari will be brought to light.