Phonotactic Constraints in Pangkhua: A Corpus-Based Analysis of Consonant Clusters and Codas

Abstract

This paper investigates the phonotactics of Pangkhua, an endangered Tibeto-Burman language spoken in Bangladesh’s Chittagong Hill Tracts, through the lens of Optimality Theory (OT). Drawing on a novel corpus of approximately 2000 IPA-transcribed utterances from elicited and spontaneous speech, we focus on consonant clusters and codas, which exhibit restricted patterns: onset clusters favor sonorant-obstruent sequences (e.g., /sk/ in [esk ͡ rai̯] ‹lion›, /nd ͡ ʒ/ in [and ͡ ʒoa̯ r] ‘sell’), while codas are predominantly nasal or liquid (e.g., /ŋ/ in [maŋ] ‘forest’, /l/ in [kal] ‘go’), disfavoring obstruents. We propose an OT constraint hierarchy, including high-ranked *NO-CODA for obstruents and *COMPLEX ONSET demoted below faithfulness constraints like IDENT, to account for these asymmetries. Tableaux demonstrate how this ranking predicts repairs such as vowel epenthesis or deletion in illicit forms, while accommodating Pangkhua’s sesquisyllabic structures. Quantitative analysis reveals cluster frequency at 15% of syllables, with reductions in spontaneous narratives, suggesting gradient implementation. This first formal modeling of Pangkhua phonotactics not only refines descriptive accounts but also contributes to Tibeto-Burman typology, highlighting OT’s efficacy in capturing Southeast Asian phonotactic preferences and challenging universal constraint assumptions. Implications for language preservation and comparative phonology are discussed.

Mother Language, 2026; 10(1): 138-168