More than otherIndo-Aryan languages, Bengali exhibits strongdiglossia between the formal, written language and the vernacular, spoken language. Two styles of writing, involving somewhat different vocabularies and syntax, have emerged :[4][5]
Shadhubhasha (সাধুভাষা) is the written language with longer verb inflections and a more Sanskrit-derived (তৎসমtôtshôm) vocabulary (সাধুshadhu = 'chaste' or 'sage'; ভাষাbhasha = 'language'). Songs such as India's national anthemJana Gana Mana (byRabindranath Tagore) and national songVande Mātaram (byBankim Chandra Chattopadhyay) were composed in Shadhubhasha, but its use is on the wane in modern writing.
Choltibhasha (চলতিভাষা ) orCholitobhasha (চলিতভাষা), a written Bengali style that reflects a more colloquial idiom, is increasingly the standard for written Bengali (চলিতcholito = 'current' or 'running'). This form came into vogue towards the turn of the 19th century, in anorthography promoted in the writings ofPeary Chand Mitra (Alaler ghare dulal, 1857),[6] Pramatha Chowdhury (Sabujpatra, 1914) and in the later writings ofRabindranath Tagore. It is modeled on the dialect spoken in theShantipur andShilaidaha region inNadia andKushtia Districts. This form of Bengali is often referred to as the "Kushtia standard" (Bangladesh) or "Nadia dialect" (West Bengal).[7]
Spoken Bengali exhibits far more variation than written Bengali. Formal spoken Bengali, including what is heard in news reports, speeches, announcements, and lectures, is modelled on Choltibhasha. This form of spoken Bengali stands alongside other spoken dialects, orAncholik Bangla (আঞ্চলিক বাংলা) (i.e. 'regional Bengali'). The majority of Bengalis are able to communicate in more than one dialect – often, speakers are fluent in Choltibhasha, one or more Ancholik dialect, and one or more forms ofGramyo Bangla (গ্রাম্য বাংলা) (i.e. 'rural Bengali'), dialects specific to a village or town.
To a non-Bengali, these dialects may sound or look vastly different, but the differences are mostly in Pronunciation and vocabulary, and not so much a grammatical one, one exception is the addition of grammatical gender in some eastern dialects. Many dialects share features withSadhu bhasha, which was the written standard until the 19th century. Comparison of Bengali dialects gives us an idea about archaic forms of the language as well.
During standardisation of Bengali in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, the cultural elite were mostly from the regions ofDhaka,Kolkata,Hooghly,Howrah,24 Parganas,Nadia andKushtia. What is accepted as the standard form today in both West Bengal and Bangladesh is based on the West-Central dialect. While the language has been standardised today through two centuries of education and media, variation is widespread, with many speakers familiar with or fluent in both their socio-geographical variety as well as the standard dialect used in the media.
Dialectal differences in Bengali manifest themselves in three forms:standardized dialect vs. regional dialect, literary language vs. colloquial language, and lexical (vocabulary) variations. The name of the dialects generally originates from the district where the language is spoken.
While the standard form of the language does not show much variation across the Bengali-speaking areas of South Asia, regional variation in spoken Bengali constitutes adialect continuum. Mostly speech varies across distances of just a few miles and takes distinct forms among religious communities.Bengali Hindus tend to speak in Sanskritised Bengali (a remnant of theSadhu bhasha),Bengali Muslims comparatively use morePerso-Arabic vocabulary andBengali Christians converse inChristian Bengali when engaging in their own circles. Apart from the present dialects, there are a few more that have disappeared. For example, Sātagāiyã' (this is the name used inEast Bengal for the dialect of the Southwestern Rarh region). The present dialects of Bengali are listed below with an example sentence meaning:
English translation: "A man had two sons." (M=male indicated i.e. A man had two sons, P= person indicated, without gender, i.e. A person had two sons)
This dialect is mainly spoken in the districts ofNorth Bengal. The dialects of the North do not have contrastive nasal vowels, tend to conserve the h-word medially, often go through l-n and n-l transitions, often in nouns, and are the only dialects where æ can be found word terminally.
The latter two, along withKharia Thar andMal Paharia, are closely related to Western Bengali dialects, but are typically classified as separate languages. Similarly,Rajbanshi language (Nepal) and Hajong are considered separate languages, although they are very similar to North Bengali dialects. There are many more minor dialects as well, including those spoken in the bordering districts ofPurnea andSinghbhum and among the tribals of eastern Bangladesh like theHajong and theChakma.
This category is for dialects, mostly restricted to certain communities instead of a region, as well as closely related languages.Dobhashi was a highly Perso-Arabised dialect, that started developing during theBengal Sultanate period. Thesadhu bhasha was a historical Sanskritised register of Bengali. Examples of heavily Sanskritised Bengali include theJana Gana Mana.
Dobhashi: "æk shakhser dui awlad chhilô." (এক শাখ্সের দুই আওলাদ ছিল।) (ايك شخصير دوئي أولاد چھیل۔) (M)
Sadhu bhasha: "kono æk bektir duṭi putrô chhilô" (কোন এক ব্যক্তির দু'টি পুত্র ছিল।) (P)
Bengali dialects includeEastern andSoutheastern Bengali dialects: The Eastern dialects serve as the primary colloquial language of theDhaka district, mixed nowadays with the standard register. In contrast to Western and Central dialects where ট [t̠] and ড [d̠] are unvoiced and voiced postalveolar stops respectively, far Eastern dialects pronounce them as apical alveolar/t/ and/d/, especially in less formal speech. These dialects also lack contrastive nasalised vowels or a distinction in র /r~ɾ/, ড়/ঢ়/ɽ/, pronouncing them mostly as/ɹ/, although some speakers may realise র /r~ɾ/ when occurring before a consonant or prosodic break. This is also true of theSylheti dialect, which has a lot in common with theKamrupi dialect of Assam in particular, and is sometimes considered a separate language. The Eastern dialects extend into Southeastern dialects, which include parts of Chittagong. TheChittagonian dialect hasTibeto-Burman influences.
The unvocied aspirated velar stopখ[kʰ], the aspirated labial stopফ[pʰ] and the voiced aspirated labial stopভ[bʱ] of western-central Bengali dialects correspond toখ় [x~χ],ফ় [ɸ~f] andভ় [b~β~v] in eastern Bengali. These pronunciations are more prevalent in theSylheti variety of northeastern Bangladesh and south Assam, the variety spoken by most of the Bengali community in the United Kingdom. Note that phonemic transcriptions from left to right for eastern Bengali dialects indicate the realizations further eastwards. Retroflexes lose aspiration and variously remain like that or become alveolar. Breathy voiced stops lose breathiness. The voiced velar stopগ [g] can fricative toগ় [ɣ], and is mostly lost afterwards.
Many eastern Bengali dialects share phonological features with Assamese, including the debuccalisation ofস,শ &ষ [ʃ] toহ [h] (but not toখ়[x]).
The influence ofTibeto-Burman languages on the phonology of eastern Bengali is seen through the lack of nasalised vowels, an alveolar articulation for theRetroflexstops ট[ʈ], ঠ[ʈʰ], ড[ɖ], and ঢ[ɖʱ], resembling the equivalent phonemes in languages such asThai andLao and the lack of distinction between র [ɾ] and ড়/ঢ় [ɽ]. Unlike most languages of the region, some Purbo Bengali dialects do not include the breathy voiced stops ঘ[ɡʱ], ঝ[dʒʱ], ঢ[d̠ʱ], ধ[d̪ʱ], and ভ[bʱ]. Some variants of Bengali, particularly Chittagonian and Chakma Bengali, have contrastivetone; differences in the pitch of the speaker's voice can distinguish words. In dialects such asHajong of northern Bangladesh, there is a distinction betweenউ andঊ, the first corresponding exactly to its standard counterpart but the latter corresponding to the Japanese[ü͍] soundlistenⓘ. There is also a distinction betweenই andঈ in many northern Bangladeshi dialects.ই representing the[ɪ] sound whereasঈ represents an[i].
^Bandyopadhyay, Anita (2001)."Problems of Phonetic Transcription in Bengali".Praci-Bhasha-Vijnan Indian Journal of Linguistics.20: 79.OCLC2256120.We all know that there are 4 or 5 dialects of the Bengali language. These are, according to Professor Suniti Kumar Chatterji and Sukumar Sen - Rarhi, Barendra, Kamarupi, Banga and Jharkhandi as added by Dr. S. Sen. NB Barendra refers to Varendri
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