Inherent vowel rules

[rehanelbengali]

The symbol ্ (হসন্ত, hasanta) is used to silence the inherent vowel a (the aw-sound as in “awful”, which for some reason is romanised as “a” instead of the more logical “o”). However, this symbol is often neglected in Bengali writing, and many times, for consonant clusters, the consonants are written separately instead of using the conjuncts. Take as an example “লিফট”, which is pronounced as “lift” (if I were to phonetically transcribe it in Bengali, লিফ্ট্) but written as if it was “lifata” (a representing the aw-sound). Is there any way to predict if the inherent vowel is not pronounced without the need of hasanta?
And is there any way to know when the inherent vowel is pronounced অ and when it’s pronounced ও?

 

[Au101]

The symbol ্ (হসন্ত, hasanta) is used to silence the inherent vowel a (the aw-sound as in “awful”, which for some reason is romanised as “a” instead of the more logical “o”).

That depends on the transliteration scheme, really, Wikipedia for example (Bengali alphabet - Wikipedia) seems to have taken it upon itself to use ô. But the reason presumably lies in the fact that Bengali is one of only a few (though there are others, such as Oriya) of India's languages in which the inherent vowel is pronounced with an o-sound. It corresponds, though, with the inherent vowel in other Indian languages which is generally pronounced like the u in up and is usually denoted a. I suppose it was considered helpful in internationalist, scholarly and linguistic circles to provide consistency in transliteration, but I should not be too surprised to find Bengali-specific material, from academic textbooks to text messages exchanged by native speakers in which a more Bengali-centric transliteration scheme is used. However, notice how the inherent vowel is denoted a, even though it is pronounced much more like u. So why isn't it u then? Presumably because then you'd have nothing for the equivalents of Bengali উ/ঊ (i.e. Devanagari उ/ऊ, generally sounded (in the case of short u) like the u in put and (in the case of long ū) like the oo in too, or everywhere like the oo in too). Similarly in Bengali if we use o for অ, what should we use for ও? And how should we reflect the fact that অ is traditionally counted as the short counterpart of long আ? Should আ then logically be ō?

The point I raised above about consistency is underlined by the fact that the Bengali alphabet isn't only used for the Bengali language. It was in fact designed around Sanskrit and did you know that the first ever text to be printed in Sanskrit was printed in Bengali letters? So I would say there's a bit more to that point than just Britishers not caring!

However, this symbol is often neglected in Bengali writing, and many times, for consonant clusters, the consonants are written separately instead of using the conjuncts. Take as an example “লিফট”, which is pronounced as “lift” (if I were to phonetically transcribe it in Bengali, লিফ্ট্) but written as if it was “lifata” (a representing the aw-sound). Is there any way to predict if the inherent vowel is not pronounced without the need of hasanta?
And is there any way to know when the inherent vowel is pronounced অ and when it’s pronounced ও?

As lazy and self-defeating as it is to simply refer to an online article (and a Wikipedia article at that) I really feel you'd benefit from a broader understanding of "schwa deletion" in Indian languages. Indian languages vary in the extent to which Sanskritic a is deleted, and Bengali is actually one of the more likely to retain it. Hindi and Punjabi delete Sanskrit a in many places, for example at the ends of words (hence Sanskrit and English Rama becomes Hindi Ram (Gandhi's last words of course being 'He Ram!' (Oh God!)), which is the cause of ceaseless wondering among native speakers of languages like Hindi about why the English can't seem to pronounce Ram properly even though they can manage to say am and arm in their own language. It also gets deleted in other positions, and even when words end in consonants. Thus you end up in Hindi with the word जन्म 'birth'. This is Sanskrit janma, but in Hindi the a is deleted at the end of the word, so you get janm. But that's not that easy to say, so some people will put the vowel back in. But not at the end of the word, where it was in Sanskrit, but between the consonants, giving you a word that is spelt with a conjunct but pronounce janam. Now let's see what happens when this word is compounded with दिन (Sanskrit dina, Hindi din) meaning 'day'. We get जन्मदिन, which in Sanskrit was janmadina as it's written, but (much to my consternation!) in Hindi it is usually read janamdin. So you have a conjunct between n and m, but a vowel is said between them, and then you have the inherent vowel written between m and di, but they're pronounced as a conjunct! And I would point out that this is a bit silly, but then I would have to defend knight, or thought and frankly I can't really do that! (The foregoing was of course intended to be humorous, but as that doesn't always come across on the internet, I just wanted to be clear that English spelling generally has its justifications and Indian spelling is generally much more logical than English at least!)

Schwa deletion in Indian languages - Wikipedia

It is generally the case that direct loans from Sanskrit (in much the same way that English treats loanwords in its spelling, which is the cause of some of the irregularities of English spelling) are spelt as they were in Sanskrit. Even if the normal rules of schwa deletion would make conjuncts unnecessary in modern Indian languages, conjuncts will be used in the spelling if they were used in Sanskrit. With other words it is much more likely that the rules of schwa deletion will be left to take care of things.

I suppose there is also the matter of simplicity. For example, if you're borrowing an English word into an Indian language, a word like badminton, say, you will need a conjunct for ḍma (I'm not very familiar with the Bengali alphabet, but in Hindi, that's not really ideal, and that's just an example that immediately came to mind), or you will need the virāma/halant/hasanta. Which is fine and everything, but it's a bit of unnecessary pain in the backside really, which is presumably why even the English don't tend to bother writing hôtel, rôle, or dépôt anymore, although we will normally go for déjà vu, mêlée and papier-mâché.

According, then, to Wikipedia

The Bengali equivalent for Schwa is Open-mid back rounded vowel or [ɔ]. Bengali deletes this vowel at the end when not ending in a consonant cluster but sometimes retains this vowel at the medial position. The consonant clusters at the end of a word usually follows a Close-mid back rounded vowel or [o]. For example, the Sanskrit word पथ (/pɐt̪ʰɐ/, way) corresponds to the Bengali word পথ /pɔt̪ʰ/. But the Skt. word अन्त (/ɐnt̪ɐ/, end) retains the end vowel and becomes অন্ত /ɔnt̪o/ in Bengali, as it ends with a consonant cluster.

However, tatsama borrowings from Sanskrit generally retain the 'ɔˈ except in word-final positions and except in very informal speech.

That vowel in medial position are not always retained. For instance, 'কলকাতা' is pronounced as /kolkat̪a/, and not /kolɔkat̪a/ (although different pronunciations based on dialect exist, none pronounce it this way).

This isn't really that well-written actually, but it seems to answer your questions, assuming its information is reliable. In brief consonant clusters will be written if they were written that way in Sanskrit and if the rules of schwa deletion in Bengali would not result in a conjunct where one is desired. If the word is etymologically descended from a word in which there was an inherent vowel but it has been lost by schwa deletion then a conjunct will not be written. See also what I said above about clarity and simplicity. At the end of the day, the Bengali script was not designed for some of the combinations of consonants you might get in foreign loanwords. From the perspective of Bengali this is simply a matter of learning the correct spelling, in much the same way that the student of English (whether native or foreign) does not need to know that knight was once pronounced with a k at the start and moreover that the gh represents a sound much like the খ় [x] sound of Eastern Bengali which is also present in Assamese.

According to Wikipedia it seems that the inherent vowel is pronounced ও after a consonant cluster at the end of a word (see the অন্ত example).

Also from Wikipedia (Bengali alphabet - Wikipedia):

The natural pronunciation of the grapheme অ, whether in its independent (visible) form or in its "inherent" (invisible) form in a consonant grapheme, is /ɔ/ [as in aw]. But its pronunciation changes to /o/ [ও] in the following contexts:

• অ is in the first syllable and there is a ই /i/ or উ /u/ in the next syllable, as in অতি ôti "much" /ot̪i/, বলছি bôlchhi "(I am) speaking" /ˈboltʃʰi/
• if the অ is the inherent vowel in a word-initial consonant cluster ending in rôphôla "rô ending" /r/, as in প্রথম prôthôm "first" /prot̪ʰom/
• if the next consonant cluster contains a jôphôla "jô ending", as in অন্য ônyô "other" /onːo/, জন্য jônyô "for" /dʒonːo/

 

[rehanelbengali]

But the reason presumably lies in the fact that Bengali is one of only a few (though there are others, such as Oriya) of India's languages in which the inherent vowel is pronounced with an o-sound. It corresponds, though, with the inherent vowel in other Indian languages which is generally pronounced like the u in up and is usually denoted a. I suppose it was considered helpful in internationalist, scholarly and linguistic circles to provide consistency in transliteration, but I should not be too surprised to find Bengali-specific material, from academic textbooks to text messages exchanged by native speakers in which a more Bengali-centric transliteration scheme is used.

The thing is, though, that even in common transcription, you will also find A used for অ most of the time, which baffles me, as I don’t think that most people know that অ comes from an etymological schwa. You will also find “y” being used for the “ja-phala” which doubles the consonant it’s being added to, but isn’t pronounced itself, and “w” used for the “ba-phala”, which does the same thing as “ja-phala”. Keep in mind that we are talking about common transcription here, not scholarly works. Even if you wanted to argue that this was an influence of the Bengali spelling, then “j” and “b” would be more logical for common people to use, since these are the diacritic versions of those letters respectively.

It is generally the case that direct loans from Sanskrit (in much the same way that English treats loanwords in its spelling, which is the cause of some of the irregularities of English spelling) are spelt as they were in Sanskrit. Even if the normal rules of schwa deletion would make conjuncts unnecessary in modern Indian languages, conjuncts will be used in the spelling if they were used in Sanskrit. With other words it is much more likely that the rules of schwa deletion will be left to take care of things.

In English loanwords, the use of conjuncts is (at least in Bengali) not consistent.

I suppose there is also the matter of simplicity. For example, if you're borrowing an English word into an Indian language, a word like badminton, say, you will need a conjunct for ḍma (I'm not very familiar with the Bengali alphabet, but in Hindi, that's not really ideal,

If a new conjunct like স্ট (sṭa), which was inexistent in Sanskrit, language for which the alphabet was originally designed, and breaks the rules of Sanskrit, could have been made just to write English loanwords with the st cluster, I do not see the problem with making a “ḍma” conjunct. In fact, when I type in ড+্+ম, the system already gives me a conjunct (ড্ম).

or you will need the virāma/halant/hasanta. Which is fine and everything, but it's a bit of unnecessary pain in the backside really, which is presumably why even the English don't tend to bother writing hôtel, rôle, or dépôt anymore, although we will normally go for déjà vu, mêlée and papier-mâché.

The thing is, though, in Bengali, the hasanta is used inconsistently in loanwords. While it is mostly neglected, I also see it being used in some Arabic loanwords with a final h-sound or with a final consonant cluster, even though a conjunct for that cluster already exists. I am assuming for the latter, that this is done to avoid the final inherent vowel that would result from writing the cluster as a conjunct, as you explained below that after a final cluster, there is an inherent vowel. From what I have seen, though, writing them the exact same way but without hasanta is equally accepted.

According to Wikipedia it seems that the inherent vowel is pronounced ও after a consonant cluster at the end of a word (see the অন্ত example).

 

[Au101]

I think ultimately you may have to accept that there aren't really any rules to be found set in stone for these things and that there is no compelling why beyond another Wikipedia observation (which I hate to quote again, but here we are!)

In the script, clusters of consonants are represented by different and sometimes quite irregular forms; thus, learning to read is complicated by the sheer size of the full set of letters and letter combinations, numbering about 350. Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar introduced punctuation marks in Bengali language and wrote book named Barnaparichay to standardize Bengali alphabets.While efforts at standardising the alphabet for the Bengali language continue in such notable centres as the Bangla Academy at Dhaka (Bangladesh) and the Pôshchimbônggô Bangla Akademi at Kolkata (West Bengal, India), it is still not quite uniform yet, as many people continue to use various archaic forms of letters, resulting in concurrent forms for the same sounds.

This isn't completely unique to Bengali. I was once quite fond of going out of my way to use the æ and œ letters in English that are very rarely seen, although some might be familiar with encyclopædia and some like to use the diæresis (see what I did there?) in words like coöperate. But Bengali is quite notable for its beautiful but complicated orthography and a long and rich history.

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Badminton is probably a better example in Devanagari than Bengali but I think people are more likely than ever to want to avoid coming up with new conjuncts. Many Indian scripts have undergone reforms to make them simpler, not more complicated. And I'm sure it's possible to come up with combinations of consonants in English words that are rather awkward to make conjuncts for in Bengali. What about slipstream or unstrapped or backstreet. স্ট is fairly obvious and straightforward so I'm not really surprised to see it.

 

[Dib]

The symbol ্ (হসন্ত, hasanta) is used to silence the inherent vowel a (the aw-sound as in “awful”, which for some reason is romanised as “a” instead of the more logical “o”). However, this symbol is often neglected in Bengali writing, and many times, for consonant clusters, the consonants are written separately instead of using the conjuncts. Take as an example “লিফট”, which is pronounced as “lift” (if I were to phonetically transcribe it in Bengali, লিফ্ট্) but written as if it was “lifata” (a representing the aw-sound). Is there any way to predict if the inherent vowel is not pronounced without the need of hasanta?
And is there any way to know when the inherent vowel is pronounced অ and when it’s pronounced ও?

Good questions but not so easy to answer. :-(

A) English lacks a letter that maps clearly to the অ sound. As Bengalis pronounce English, this sound may correspond to a (ball), o (cod), aw (awe), etc. So, the romanisation of this sound in chat-speak etc. is unstable. I prefer o just like you, but a is indeed very common as well, which may also be due to influence of other languages like Au101 pointed out.

B) Why hasanta is not very common … I think, it’s really a matter of lack of standardisation. Bengali spelling-pronunciation mapping is in general rather inconsistent. So, people seem to tolerate a higher degree of unpredictability. Having said that, I personally also prefer লিফ্ট্, am okay with লিফ্ট, and hate লিফট for what it is worth. 😝

C) Coming to the matter of schwa deletion broached by Au101, the following general (not necessarily super-helpful 😝) outline can be given (quoting myself from elsewhere):

1. In simple, i.e. uncompounded, Sanskrit words, Bengali pronunciation tends to avoid any schwa deletion, except possibly at the word-end. The final schwa may be deleted (but isn’t in all words) only if it comes after a simple consonant (i.e. no conjuncts). So, “mata” (opinion) undergoes schwa-deletion at the end but “hata” (killed) does not.
2. In Sanskrit compounds, if the first element is pronounced with a final schwa on its own, then it is retained also in the compound. However, if it undergoes schwa deletion when standing alone, the schwa may or may not be restored in the compound. Example: in the last point I mentioned the word “mata” (opinion) which loses the final schwa when stand-alone. But in the compound “mata-bheda” (difference of opinion) the schwa at the end of mata is pronounced (that at the end of bheda isn’t). But, in mata-parivartana (change of opinion), the schwa at the end of mata is usually not pronounced.
3. In native/non-Sanskrit words, it is even more complicated to predict. One tendency is to delete the schwa in the 2nd, 4th, etc. alternate open syllables from the beginning. But there is also a tendency to delete the last schwa and retain the one before it. So, you can’t really predict when they conflict. Examples: The spelling “sarala” can undergo two different patterns of schwa deletion in pronuncition. With the last schwa deleted, it is a Sanskrit loanword, meaning “simple/straight”, while with the middle schwa deleted it is a verb meaning “he/she/it/they moved”. The spelling “āsala”, pronounced with the final schwa deleted is an Arabic loanword meaning “original”. With the middle schwa-deleted, it is a verb “he/she/it/they came”.
   

By the way, the same pronunciation may be spelt in two different ways for two different meanings as well, e.g. “āsto” is spelt both āsata (=he/she/it/they used to come) and āsta (=whole, entire, intact) depending on the meaning.

D) Again there are various patterns of the pronunciation of the ‘schwa’.
1. The word-final schwa is pronounced অ in one syllable words (letter names, ব = carry! হ = be!) and ও in longer words.
2. Word internally it is by default অ।
3. When the schwa is followed by an i, u, য-ফলা in the next syllable in the same word it becomes ও, e.g. করি (I/we do), করুক (let him/her/them do), পদ্য (poetry - pronounced পোদ্দো), etc. Exception: some modern English loanwords (body > বডি). Also the negative prefix অ- is usually not pronounced ও (e.g. অশিক্ষিত)।
4. In two syllable words, a schwa in the second syllable seems to be often pronounced as ও, especially in Calcutta: প্রাপক (receiver).
5. It is ও also often before n: বন (forest) is usually homophonous to বোন (sister) in Calcutta.
I am sure there are more subpatterns that I am missing right now.

 

[rehanelbengali]

However, notice how the inherent vowel is denoted a, even though it is pronounced much more like u. So why isn't it u then? Presumably because then you'd have nothing for the equivalents of Bengali উ/ঊ (i.e. Devanagari उ/ऊ, generally sounded (in the case of short u) like the u in put and (in the case of long ū) like the oo in too, or everywhere like the oo in too).

And as for the rendering vowels in English transcriptions of foreign words, I think that has more to do with the tendency to assign the vowel letters their “continental values” (i.e., the values they hold in most European languages using the Latin script) when transcribing from foreign scripts, so for instance, the continental values of the letters A, E, I, O and U are what we would write in English as a, ay, ee, o and oo respectively. Therefore, the “uh” sound as it is in English is closer to continental “a” than it is to continental “u”, which we would write in English as “oo”, and that makes A a better choice to transcribe the “uh” vowel if we want to assign the vowel letters their continental values.