Pashto - Dialects

Dialects

Pashto has two main dialects: a softer dialect spoken in the south, and a harsher dialect in the north. The former is further divided into southwestern and southeastern dialects, and the latter into northwestern (also called central or Ghilzai dialect) and northeastern. It is dominated by the geographical spread of the shift in the pronunciation of these five consonants:

The morphological differences between the most extreme north-eastern and south-western dialects are comparatively few and unimportant, and the criteria of dialect differentiation in Pashto are primarily phonological.