The
phoneme inventory of Khwarshi is large, with about 87 distinct
phonemes. Notable phonological processes include
assimilation,
vowel harmony, and
nasalization occurring. The
syllabic structure of Khwarshi is also quite simple, with (C)V(C) being the most common structure, of which V(C) is only permitted word-initially.
Vowels Khwarshi has a total number of 21
vowel phonemes, including
vowel length and
nasalization. All the vowels above also have a long counterpart, which are always in stressed syllables. All vowels can occur in closed syllables (i.e. (C)VC), and all except occur in open syllables (i.e. (C)V). does not occur in the
Khwarshi Proper and
Inkhokwari dialects. • All the nasal vowels above except /ĩ/ have a long counterpart. • There is no nasalized version of /ɨ/. • The
Khwarshi Proper dialect does not have nasalized vowels and replaces these with their non-nasalized counterparts.
Consonants Khwarshi has 66
consonants: It is not clear whether is present in Khwarshi or not, as
Zaira Khalilova does not include it in her chart of consonants, but nevertheless provides a minimal pair indicating there is a distinction between and :
"touch" and
"fly". Therefore, it is shown in parentheses in the chart above. All the consonants can be found in native
vocabulary, but some of them are however more rare than others, and some are mostly found in
loanwords, such as which almost only occur in loanwords of
Arabic origin. Another example is , found only in loanwords of
Avar origin. The
palatalized consonant and all the
pharyngealized consonants are not found in
Khwarshi Proper, but can be found in all the other dialects. Consider for instance the
Khwarshi Proper word
"drunk", which in the other dialects is .
Gemination Gemination is quite a common
phonological process in Khwarshi, caused by
grammatical processes. Gemination only occurs intervocally and not all consonants geminate. Which consonants that geminate is different according to which processes they are a part of, and it depends on the dialect as well. Below is a list of some of the processes causing gemination: • When
suffixing the
past participle-ending to a
verbal stem ending in a consonant, the final consonant is geminated, e.g.
"to eat" >
"eaten". • When
suffixing the
present tense-ending, which generally is , the final consonant is geminated, e.g.
"to eat" >
"eat-". Notice that
ejectivization is lost with the present tense-ending, while it is kept with the past participle-ending. • When
suffixing the
verbal noun-ending to a
verbal stem, the verbal noun-ending is geminated - not the final consonant, e.g.
"to drop" >
"something which has been dropped". • When
infixing the potential marker to a
verbal stem, the potential marker is geminated, e.g.
"to drop" >
"to potentially drop". • When
emphasis is needed, the consonants of some words may be geminated, e.g.
"much" >
"much indeed". It is highly idiomatic though, and does not apply to all words. In
loanwords, geminated consonants are normally non-geminated, when adopted into the Khwarshi language. For example, the
Avar word
"mosquito" is found as in Khwarshi. The same goes for words of
Tindi origin such as
"small", which is found as in Khwarshi. Another interesting aspect of loanwords of Tindi origin in the Khwarshi language is that the consonants are
ejectivized when they enter the Khwarshi language, e.g.
Tindi "small intestine" > Khwarshi . == Alphabet ==