The Representation of the Phoneme /r/ in Ajabshir Turkish Dialect within Optimality Theory

This research is aimed to describe and analyze the representation of phoneme /r/ in different phonological environments in Ajabshir Turkish dialect within Optimality theoretical framework. Optimality theory describes phonological processes with interaction of faithfulness and markedness constraints. Data of this research is gathered from illiterate and old native speakers of Ajabshir. It should be noted that phoneme /r/ has no vocal presentation in any phonological environments in this dialect and consistently either converts to phoneme /j/ or deleted. The aim of this research is to clarify the positions in which phoneme /r/ converts to phoneme /j/ or the phonological positions in which deletion occurs; and what are the active markedness constraints in describing this processes; and what is the ranking of this constraints. Analysis of data within Optimality theoretical framework shows that phoneme /r/ in onset and coda position of syllable converts to phoneme /j/; which means *trill markedness constraint is active in this dialect and has a higher rank to IDENT(trill) faithfulness constraint, additionally if /r/ is the first consonant of the coda position in consonant cluster and the vowel of the syllable has [+back] feature, consonant /r/ will be deleted, but if in the same position the vowel has [-back] feature consonant /r/ will convert to /j/.