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Some dialects, particularly those of the Chittagong region, bear only a superficial resemblance to SCB. However, a majority in Bangladesh speaks dialects notably different from SCB. There are cases where speakers of Standard Bengali in West Bengal will use a different word from a speaker of Standard Bengali in Bangladesh, even though both words are of native Bengali descent.
Words by Topics
The standard literary form of Modern Bengali was developed during the 19th and early 20th centuries based on the west-central dialect spoken in Shantipur region of the Nadia district. The local Apabhraṃśa of the eastern subcontinent, Purbi Apabhraṃśa or Abahatta (lit. ’meaningless sounds’), eventually evolved into regional dialects, which in turn formed three groups, the Bengali–Assamese languages, the Bihari languages, and the Odia language. Bengali consonants form the core of the Bengali writing system.
For example, the combination of the consonants ক্ k and ষ ʂ is graphically realised as ক্ষ and is pronounced kkʰo (as in রুক্ষ rukkʰo “coarse”), kʰɔ (as in ক্ষমতা kʰɔmota “capability”) or even kʰo (as in ক্ষতি kʰoti “harm”), depending on the position of the cluster in a word. The inherent vowel attached to every consonant can be either ɔ or o depending on vowel harmony (স্বরসঙ্গতি) with the preceding or following vowel or on the context, but this phonological information is not captured by the script, creating ambiguity for the reader. In general, the Bengali-Assamese script is fairly transparent for grapheme-to-phoneme conversion, i.e., it is easier to predict the pronunciation from spelling of the words, though there are many cases where pronunciation is different from what is written. It is a cursive script with eleven graphemes or signs denoting nine vowels and two diphthongs, and thirty-nine graphemes representing consonants and other modifiers. The phonemic inventory of standard Bengali consists of 29 consonants and 7 vowels, as well as 7 nasalised vowels. Bengali exhibits diglossia, though some scholars have proposed triglossia or even n-glossia or heteroglossia between the written and spoken forms of the language.
In general, the script is fairly transparent for “tadbhav” words (native Bengali words). The Bengali script in general has a comparatively shallow orthography when compared to the Latin script used for English and French, i.e., in many cases there is a one-to-one correspondence between the sounds (phonemes) and the letters (graphemes) of Bengali. Up until the 19th century, numerous variations of the Arabic script had been used across Bengal from Chittagong in the east to Meherpur in the west.
- Notuner Gaan known as “Chol Chol Chol” is Bangladesh’s national march, written by The National Poet Kazi Nazrul Islam in Bengali in 1928.
- For example, the combination of the consonants ক্ k and ষ ʂ is graphically realised as ক্ষ and is pronounced kkʰo (as in রুক্ষ rukkʰo “coarse”), kʰɔ (as in ক্ষমতা kʰɔmota “capability”) or even kʰo (as in ক্ষতি kʰoti “harm”), depending on the position of the cluster in a word.
- During the medieval period, Middle Bengali was characterised by the elision of the word-final অ ô and the spread of compound verbs, which originated from the Sanskrit schwa.
Alternative and historic scripts
As a head-final language, Bengali follows a subject–object–verb word order, although variations on this theme are common. However, nouns and pronouns are moderately declined (altered depending on their function in a sentence) into four cases while verbs are heavily conjugated, and the verbs do not change form depending on the number of the noun. Published under the imprint of Benglish Books, these are based on phonetic transliteration and closely follow spellings used in social media but for using an underline to describe soft consonants. As the spelling often doesn’t reflect the actual pronunciation, transliteration and transcription are often different. Transliteration is orthographically accurate (i.e. the original spelling can be recovered), whereas transcription is phonetically accurate (the pronunciation can be reproduced). So when these Sanskrit words re-entered the Bengali vocabulary as tatsam words, their pronunciations were modified, but their spellings were retained.
Non-finite verbs have no inflection for tense or person, while finite verbs are fully inflected for person (first, second, third), tense (present, past, future), aspect (simple, perfect, progressive), and honour (intimate, familiar, and formal), but not for number. However, when the semantic class of the noun is understood from the measure word, the noun is often omitted and only the measure word is used, e.g. শুধু একজন থাকবে। Shudhu êk-jôn thakbe. In most of Bengali grammar books, cases are divided into 6 categories and an additional possessive case (the possessive form is not recognised as a type of case by Bengali grammarians).
It is primarily spoken by the Bengali people, native to the Bengal region (Bangladesh, India’s West Bengal) as well as in Barak Valley in Assam and Tripura in South Asia. Bengali,a also known by its endonym Bangla,b is a classical Indo-Aryan language belonging to the Indo-Iranian branch of the Indo-European language family.
Understanding how words are formed and related helps build vocabulary more efficiently. Bengali has specific sounds that don’t exist in other languages. Include the Bengali script, pronunciation, and meaning. This helps with pronunciation, rhythm, and getting familiar with the natural flow of the language. Most nouns are gender-neutral, and gender is mainly indicated through pronouns and some specific words. Bengali has minimal gender distinctions compared to other Indo-Aryan languages.
During the standardisation of Modern Bengali in the 19th century and early 20th century, the cultural centre of Bengal was in Kolkata, a city founded by the British. Some varieties of Bengali, particularly Sylheti, Chittagonian and Chakma, have contrastive tone; differences in crazy time strategy the pitch of the speaker’s voice can distinguish words. Regional varieties in spoken Bengali constitute a dialect continuum. In 2009, elected representatives in both Bangladesh and West Bengal called for Bengali to be made an official language of the United Nations.