2022, Vol. 4, Issue 1, Part A

In present paper we try to explore the different sound changes and consonant-clusters in Milky language. In Siwan District of Bihar, Milky is in close bilingualism with Urdu and Bhojpuri. An analysis of the phonological processess of Milky following a comparative framework is made. Milky being an Indo-Aryan language, there are a lot of words which are common to Urdu, Bhojpuri and Milky. The phonological sound changes in Milky is portrayed by drawing a comparison with Urdu and Bhojpuri. The focus of this study is to show the nature of relationship Milky shares with Urdu and Bhojpuri. Milky undergo some phonological changes that is in tune with Bhojpuri. We also analyzed consonant- clusters in Milky at initial, medial and final positions.

Methodology: This paper is based on the methodology followed by modern Sociolinguistics (William Labov 1984,). Hajipur and Korigauya are the two main areas utilized for data collection, in Siwan District in Bihar. These villages were selected as these two villages have the largest concentration of Milky Shaikh population. Sociolinguistic interviews and participant observation are the two main techniques for data collection. The corpus of data is based on 60 hours of natural speech.