Description and analysis of lenition in Kalhori Kurdish

One of the common phonological processes in the sound system of Kalhori Kurdish is lenition process. This process occurs in Kalhori Kurdish when the peak margin constraint is not observed in the final consonant clusters of the syllable. In this study it will be shown that constraint of observing sonority sequence in consonant clusters cannot be a motivation for the lenition process in the final consonant clusters of a syllable in Kalhori Kurdish and this motivation should be regarded as peak margin constraint. It will also be argued that prioritizing the peak margin constraint in this dialect will cause the lenition process to be considered a more optimal process than deletion and insertion processes despite the fact that the process of sonority sequence is not satisfied.