# Hindi, Urdu: jhijhakna + iye a schwa deletion



## tonyspeed

"mat jhijhakie" or "mat jhijhkie" ?


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## Qureshpor

Urdu:

I'd go for "jhij*a*ki'e". Without the schwa, it sounds wrong to my ears.


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## Dib

I too have the same feeling as Qureshpor, and am wondering why. Normally, schwa is deleted in -V1C1(a)C2V2- environments as we know. Why not here? I have two ideas and would like to test them:

1. jh is prosodically treated like a geminate (like Sanskrit does with ch). If so, the schwa deletion should also be blocked in the causative form - jhijh*a*kaanaa, or the past tense jhijh*a*kaa. But is it? (I think, the schwa is deleted in these cases, suggesting this idea is wrong)

2. The ending -i(y)e is (sometimes? when?) actually realized as a single-syllable -ye, giving a V1C1aC2ye environment blocking the schwa deletion. But if that is really so, then the schwa deletion should be blocked also in bhug*a*t(i)ye, etc. But is it? I think, it is, but I am not totally sure.

Is there any other possibility? Does the idea (2) make sense?


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## tonyspeed

Manjari Ohala writes in Aspects of Hindi Phonology about the idea of sequential constraints within a language and how some consonant clusters may be illegal in the minds of a native speaker. The acceptable medial consonant clusters are here and it would seem that jhk is actually accepatable. So there SHOULD be no problem with jhijkiye. 

However, in another paper by B. P. Gupta entitled "A Rule of Deaspiration in Colloquial Hindi" states that aspirated consonants are deaspirated if there is already another aspirated consonant proceeding it. My guess is that even though, in Hindi, it is spelled jhijhakie, it is actually pronounced jhijakie by native speakers. Changing jhijakie to jhijkie would break a sequential constraint since the cluster jk does not exist medially naturally.


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## Dib

tonyspeed said:


> ... it would seem that jhk is actually accepatable. So there SHOULD be no problem with jhijkiye.



We should remember, though, that initial/medial so-called "aspirated" stops in a stop cluster are regularly deaspirated. You don't really have that extra puff of air between the two stops, that would make the first one phonetically aspirated. So, morpho-phonemic "-jhk-" clusters are likely just "-jk-" phonetically.



tonyspeed said:


> However, in another paper by B. P. Gupta entitled "A Rule of Deaspiration in Colloquial Hindi" states that aspirated consonants are deaspirated if there is already another aspirated consonant proceeding it.



True, and this contributes to some spelling differences between Hindi and Urdu. But I think it is more of a sound shift in progress than a completed shift. In my experience, this deaspiration is still uncommon in some speakers and some words. (Btw, those interested in historical IE linguistics, this is akin to Grassmann's law.)



> Changing jhijakie to jhijkie would break a sequential constraint since the cluster jk does not exist medially naturally.



I doubt that is correct. The past tense form, I believe, is still "jhij(h)kaa" with deleted schwa. *Correct me, if I am wrong*. And Platts has an entry for "jhijkaanaa" too.


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## tonyspeed

Dib said:


> I doubt that is correct. The past tense form, I believe, is still "jhij(h)kaa" with deleted schwa. *Correct me, if I am wrong*. And Platts has an entry for "jhijkaanaa" too.



This is interesting. Here we see the same case treated two different ways based on context.

This may tie in with some of Ohala's other points on schwa-deletion. When there are prefixes and suffixes like "a", "be", "ii", they are dropped before the schwa-deletion is applied. 
Could it be that, mentally, people are treating iye as a suffix, whereas, mentally, people are treating verb conjugation endings "iiN, ii,aa,e" as part of the word itself?

If would be interesting to test if this applies in other similar cases.

What about jhijhko vs jhijhako? jhijhako doesn't seem right to me. This would show that jhijhakiye is being treated specially. Second theory: it is being treated as formal, polite language, therefore preserving the schwa.


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## littlepond

I think Dib's (2) in post no. 3 has a point. "jhijh*a*kiye", "bhug*a*tiye", "sar*a*kiye", "pak*a*Riye"* - in all of these, schwa is not deleted. I think that mentally the word maps to word root + ye, rather than "iye" ending. It's the gliding to the "ye", that produces the short "i" sound in between, if that makes sense.

* For this particular word, a colloquial pron. "pakRiye", esp. when the speaker is speaking fast, also exists.


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## Chhaatr

tonyspeed said:


> "mat jhijhakie" or "mat jhijhkie" ?



_mat jhijhakiye._


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## marrish

^ And what about jhi*jha*kiye v. jhi*ja*kiye? As you would know, in Urdu this is the spelling and pronounciation. tonyspeed and Dib suggested that it is pronounced identically as in Urdu.

Since I hadn't yet taken part in the discussion, it is with "a" for me.


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## Chhaatr

^ I answered on the basis of my Hindi pronounciation.  Haven't checked the dictionary but I'm sure if I did, you would be right as you always are _dost_.


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## marrish

I'm not always right!!! In Urdu it is "jhijak" - not "jhijhak", just for your information.


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## Chhaatr

^ _jaankaarii ke liye bahut dhanyavaad!_


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## littlepond

In Hindi, "jhijhakiye". I am surprised to learn about the spelling in Urdu. A mistake carried over?


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## tonyspeed

littlepond said:


> I think Dib's (2) in post no. 3 has a point. "jhijh*a*kiye", "bhug*a*tiye", "sar*a*kiye", "pak*a*Riye"* - in all of these, schwa is not deleted. I think that mentally the word maps to word root + ye, rather than "iye" ending. It's the gliding to the "ye", that produces the short "i" sound in between, if that makes sense.
> 
> * For this particular word, a colloquial pron. "pakRiye", esp. when the speaker is speaking fast, also exists.




Does samajhnaa also follow this logic? samajhie vs samjhie?

samjhie sounds right to me...


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## littlepond

^ Should be "samajhiye". However, one does hear "samjhie", though much less frequently than the former.


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## Chhaatr

This deletion on "a", (I'm not aware of technical term and it is also of no interest to me), is quite common.  Many of my friends from Lucknow say _samjhii meN nahiiN aa rahaa / samjhii meN nahiiN aayaa _when then mean _samajh meN hii nahiiN aa rahaa / samajh meN hii nahiiN aayaa.

_


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## littlepond

^ I think that towards Bihar, schwas are mostly retained wherever they ought to be (and even "raihnaa" becomes 'rahnaa"); the Lucknow side gobbles up more. However, Chhatr jii, your response is very interesting, as I didn't know about "samjhii". Rhymes with "terii buddhii [mein nahin ghus rahaa]"


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## Chhaatr

Littlepond jii, samjhii in above sentences = samajh hii.


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## tonyspeed

littlepond said:


> I think Dib's (2) in post no. 3 has a point. "jhijh*a*kiye", "bhug*a*tiye", "sar*a*kiye", "pak*a*Riye"* - in all of these, schwa is not deleted. I think that mentally the word maps to word root + ye, rather than "iye" ending. It's the gliding to the "ye", that produces the short "i" sound in between, if that makes sense.
> 
> * For this particular word, a colloquial pron. "pakRiye", esp. when the speaker is speaking fast, also exists.



In M.  Ohala's "Aspects of Hindi Phonology" she talks about certain suffixes that block schwa deletion: iya and izm.  It would seem  iye is another.


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