Kurdish languages

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Kurdish
كوردی, Kurdî, К'ӧрди
Spoken in	Kurdistan  Iran,  Iraq,  Syria,  Turkey,  Armenia,  Lebanon, (see article for full list)
Region	West Asia
Total speakers	26,000,000[1]
Ranking	52
Language family	Indo-European  Indo-Iranian   Iranian    Western Iranian     Northwestern Iranian      Kurdish
Writing system	Kurdish alphabet (modified Perso-Arabic alphabet in Iraq and Iran, Latin alphabet in Turkey and Syria, modified Cyrillic in the former USSR)
Official status
Official language in	Iraq  Iran - constitutional status as a regional language.  Armenia - minority language[2]
Regulated by	No official regulation
Language codes
ISO 639-1	ku
ISO 639-2	kur
ISO 639-3	variously: kur – Kurdish (generic) ckb – Central Kurdish kmr – Northern Kurdish sdh – Southern Kurdish Infobox
Note: This page may contain IPA phonetic symbols in Unicode.

Kurdish is not a firm and standardized linguistic entity with the status of an official or state language. On the contrary, it is a continuum of closely related dialects that are spoken in a large geographic area spanning several national states, in some of these states forming one, or several, regional substandards (e.g., Kurmanji in Turkey; Sorani in northern Iraq).^[3]

Today the term Kurdish language (Kurdish: Kurdî or کوردی) is a term used for several languages spoken by Kurds. It is mainly concentrated in parts of Iran, Iraq, Syria and Turkey.^[4]

Kurdish languages belong to the northwestern sub-group of the Iranian languages, which themselves belong to the Indo-Iranian branch of the Indo-European language family. The most closely related languages to Kurdish are Balochi, Gileki and Talysh, all of which belong to the north-western branch of Iranian languages. There are also transitional dialects between Southern Kurdish and the Lori and Bakhtiari dialects which are in the south-western branch of Iranian.

Contents 1 Origin and roots 2 History 3 Current status 4 Dialects 5 Kurmanji and Sorani 6 Kurdish not an endo-linguonym 7 Phonology 7.1 Consonants 7.2 Vowels 8 Historical phonology 9 Indo-European linguistic comparison 10 Vocabulary 11 Writing system 12 Dictionaries 12.1 Kurdish-only dictionaries 12.2 Kurdish-English dictionaries 13 References 14 See also 15 External links 15.1 Religious texts 15.2 Kurdish broadcast programs

[edit] Origin and roots

The Kurdish language belongs to the north-western sub-group of the Iranian languages, which in turn belongs to the Indo-Iranian branch of the Indo-European family. From about the 10th century BC, Iranian tribes spread in the area now corresponding to Kurdistan, among them Medes, speakers of a Northwest Iranian dialect. Gradual linguistic assimilation of the various indigenous peoples to this Median language in the course of the Iron Age marks the beginning of Kurdish ethnogenesis. The older Hurrian language of the people inhabiting the Kurdish areas was replaced by Indo-European around 850 BCE, with the arrival of the Medes to Western Iran ^{[5][dubious – discuss]} A linguistic group influential on Kurdish to a lesser degree was Aramaic.

[edit] History

Although Kurdish has a northwestern Iranian root, little is known about Kurdish in pre-Islamic times. The most notable language in this group is Median, of which little is known either, other than that it shared important phonological isoglosses with Avestan.

Among the earliest Kurdish religious texts is Mashafa Rash/Mishefa Reş (The Black Book) the sacred book of Yazidi faith. It is considered to have been authored by Hassan bin Adi (b. 1400 AD), the great-grandnephew of the founder of the faith (Shiekh Adi), sometime in the 13th century AD. It contains the Yazidi account of the creation of the world, the origin of man, the story of Adam and Eve and the major prohibitions of the faith^[6]. From the 15th to 17th centuries, classical Kurdish poets and writers developed a literary language. The most famous classical Kurdish poets from this period are Ali Hariri, Ahmad Khani, Malaye Jaziri and Faqi Tayran.

The Italian priest Maurizio Garzoni published the first Kurdish grammar titled Grammatica e Vocabolario della Lingua Kurda in Rome in 1787 after eighteen years of missionary work among the Kurds of Amadiyah^[7]. This work is very important in the Kurdish history as it is the first acknowledgement of the originality of the Kurdish language on a scientific base. Garzoni was given the title of Father of Kurdology by later scholars^[8]. The Kurdish language was banned in a large portion of Kurdistan (a pseudo-state for a nation which has never had its own state) for some time. Turkey, having a history of conflict with the Kurds, until 1991 the use of the Kurdish language was illegal in Turkey, as part of the effort. ^[9]

[edit] Current status

Today, Kurdish is an official language in Iraq, while it is banned in Syria where it is forbidden to publish material in Kurdish.^[10] Before August 2002, the Turkish government placed severe restrictions on the use of Kurdish, prohibiting the language in education and broadcast media.^[11][12]. The Kurdish alphabet is still not recognized in Turkey, and use of Kurdish names containing the letters X, W, and Q, which do not exist in the Turkish alphabet, is not allowed. Also according to the article 42 of Turkey's constitution No language other than Turkish shall be taught as a "mother tongue" to citizens of Turkey at any institution of training or education like it is for many countries ^[13]. But this doesn't include private education.

In Iran, though it is used in some local media and newspapers, it is not used in schools ^{[14] [15]}. In 2005, 80 Iranian Kurds took part in an experiment and gained scholarships to study in Kurdish in Iraqi Kurdistan ^[16].

In March 2006, Turkey allowed private television channels to begin airing Kurdish language programming. However, the Turkish government said that they must avoid showing children's cartoons, or educational programs that teach the Kurdish language, and can only broadcast for 45 minutes a day or four hours a week. ^[17] Kurdish blogs have emerged in recent years as virtual fora where Kurdish-speaking Internet users can express themselves in their native Kurdish or in other languages. Kurdish satellite television is also available in the Middle East and Europe.^{[citation needed]}

State-run Turkish Radio and Television Corporation (TRT) started its 24-hour Kurdish television station on 1 January 2009 with the motto of “we live under the same sky”.^[18] Turkish Prime Minister sent a video message in Kurdish to the opening ceremony which is attended by Minister of Culture and other state officials. The channel uses the controversial X, W, Q letters during broadcasting.

[edit] Dialects

Kurdish has two standardized dialects: a northern and a central one. The northern dialect, Northern Kurmanji also commonly referred to simply as Kurmanji, is spoken in northern half of Iraqi Kurdistan, Caucasus, Anatolia and Syria. The central dialect, called Sorani, is spoken in west Iran and much of the Iraqi Kurdistan.^[19].

[edit] Kurmanji and Sorani

Kurmanji or Northern Kurmanji is more archaic than the other dialects in both phonetic and morphological structure, and it is conjectured that the differences between central and northern dialects, have been caused by the proximity of central group to the other Iranian languages.^[20]. According to Philip Kreyenbroek (1992), it may also be misleading to call Northern Kurmanji and Sorani "dialects" because they are in some ways as different from one another as German and English.^[21] However, both dialects are widely accepted as part of a Kurmanji branch of languages spoken by Kurds.

According to Encyclopaedia of Islam, although Kurdish is not a unified language, its many dialects are interrelated and at the same time distinguishable from other western Iranian languages. The same source classifies different Kurdish dialects as two main groups of northern and central. ^[20]. The reality is that the average Kurmanji speaker will not find it easy to communicate with the inhabitants of Suleymania or Halabja.^[22]

Sorani differs on six grammatical points from Kurmanji which appear to be a result of Gorani (Haurami) influence,

1. The passive conjugation: the Sorani passive morpheme -r-/-ra - corresponds to -y-/-ya - in Gorani and Zaza, while Kurmanci employs the auxiliary hatin, come;
2. a definite suffix -eke, also occurring in Zaza;
3. an intensifying postverb -ewe, corresponding to Kurmanci preverbal ve-;
4. an 'open compound' construction with a suffix -e, for definite noun phrases with anepithet;
5. the preservation of enclitic personal pronouns, which have disappeared in Kurmanci and in Zaza;
6. a simplified izafe system.

Gorani which in medieval ages was literary idiom of modern Sorani-speaking areas, has eventually been replaced by Sorani.

[edit] Kurdish not an endo-linguonym

The use of the word "Kurdish" to describe the language or languages that Kurds speak may be the very cause of controversies regarding the differences among the dialects or languages. Outside of foreign conversation or literature, the majority of Kurds use the name of the dialect they speak in order to describe their dialect or language, and sometimes even one another. The use of the word, Kurdish, by contrast, has been used more often to simply describe the ethnic identity of the Kurds reflecting the significant differences between the dialects or languages.

Some linguistic scholars assert that the term "Kurdish" has been extrinsically applied in describing the language the Kurds speak, while Kurds intuitively have used the word to simply describe their ethnic or national identity and refer to their language as Kurmanji, Sorani, Hewrami, or whatever other dialect or language they are native to. Some historians have noted that only until recent history have a small minority of Kurds who speak the Sorani dialect begun referring to their language as Kurdî, in addition to their identity, which is translated to simply mean Kurdish.^[23]

[edit] Phonology

According to the Kurdish Academy of Language, Kurdish has the following phonemes:

[edit] Consonants

	Bilabial	Labio- dental	Apical	Post- alveolar	Palatal	Velar	Uvular	Pharyn- geal	Glottal
Nasal	m		n			ŋ
Plosive	p b		t d			k g	q
Fricative		f v	s z	ʃ ʒ	ç	x ɣ		ħ ʕ	h
Affricate				ʧ ʤ
Lateral			l ɫ1
Flap			ɾ
Trill			r
Approximant		ʋ			j

1. Just as in many English dialects, the velarised lateral does not appear in the onset of a syllable. Additionally, in some dialects, the velarised lateral changes to a ɾ in women's speech.^[24]
2. K and g are strongly palatalised before the high and mid front vowels (i and e) as well as the rounded high front allophone ɥ of the phoneme w, closing on tʃ and dʒ.^[25]

[edit] Vowels

	Front	Central	back unrounded	back rounded
high close	i			u
high open			ɪ	ʊ
mid close	e			o
Mid open		ə
Low		a

As in most modern Iranian languages, Kurdish vowels contrast in quality; they often carry a secondary length distinction that does not affect syllabic weight.^[26] This distinction appears in writing systems developed for Kurdish. The three "short" vowels are ə, ɪ and ʊ and the five long vowels are a, e, i, o and u.

[edit] Historical phonology

OP	MP	Persian	Kurdish	Parthian	Avestan	Proto-Iranian
θ	h	h	s	s	s	*ś
d	d	d	z	z	z	*ź
ç	s	s	s?	hr	θr ('s'?)	*θr
s/z	s/z	s/z	sp?/zw?	sp/zw	sp/zw	*św/ *źw
pasā	pas	pas	pāš	paš	pas-ča	*pas-ča
j	z	z	ž	ž	j	*j, *Vč
ç	z	z	ž	ž	ç	* ç
duv-	d-	d-	d-	b-	duu-	*dw-
(h)uv-	xw-	x(w)-	x(w)-	wx-	xv-, huu-	*hw-
rd	l, r	l	unclear (maybe: l, ł, r)	rδ & rz	rd & rz	*rd & *rź
y-	j-	j-	j-	y-	y-	*y-
fr-	fr- (hr-)	for- etc.	fr-	fr-	fr-	*fr-
θw	h	h	h? or w/v?	f	θw	*θw
b, d, g	w, y, (')	w, y, (/nil)	w, y, (nil)	β, δ, γ	b, d, g	*b, *d, *g
p, t, k	b, d, g,	b, d, g	w, h, y, (/nil)	β, δ, γ	p, t, k	*p, *t, *k
nd	nd/nn	nd	n	nd	nd	*nd
šn	šn	šn	žn	zn	sn	*śn
Všm, Vhm	-šm, -hm	-šm, -xm	-v (-w)	-šm, -hm	-šm, -hm	*šm?
Vm	-m	-m	-v (-w)	-m	-m	-*m
x-	x-	x-	k-	x-	x-	*x-
šiyav-	šaw-	šaw-	č-	šaw-	šiiu-	*čyau-
w-	w-	b-	b-	w-	w-	*w-
ft	ft	ft	(w)t, (ft?)	ft	ft	*ft
xt	xt	xt	t	xt	xt	*xt

[edit] Indo-European linguistic comparison

Because Kurdish language is an Indo-European language, there are many words that are cognates in Kurdish and other Indo-European languages such as Avestan, Persian, Sanskrit, German, English, Norwegian, Latin and Greek. (Source: Altiranisches Wörterbuch (1904) for the first two and last six.)

Kurdish	Avestan	Persian	Sanskrit	Greek	English	German	Swedish	Latin	Lithuanian	Russian	PIE
ez "I"	äzəm [ezìm]	adam [Old Persian]	aham	egō	I (< OE ić)	ich	jag	ego	aš	ja (from old ES jazŭ, related to OCS azŭ)	*h₁eĝh₂om
lepik,dest "Hand"		dast			(OE lōf "fillet, band")	(OHG lappo "palm (of the hand)")	handflata "palm (of the hand)"		lṓpa"paw, claw"	lápa	*tlāp-[2]
jin "woman"	ghenãnãmca [ghenâ] "woman"	zan	janay-	gynēka	queen	(OHG quena)	kvinna	femina	(OPruss. genna)	žená "wife"	*gʷenh₂-
leystin(bileyzim) "to play(I play)"		ley ley kardan(to jump with one foot )	réjati	paizo	play	leich	leka		láigīti		*(e)lAig'- "to jump, to spring, to play"[3]
mezin,gewre "great"	maz-, mazant		mah(ī)-/mahānt-	megas	much (< OE mićil, myćil)	(OHG mihhil)	mycket "much"	magnus	milžinas "giant"	mogúčij "powerful", "mighty"	*meĝh₂- "big, great" [4]
mêzer "headband/turban"		mitrā- "god name"(Old Persian)	mitrah	mitra "headband, turban",						mir "world, peace"	*mei- "to tie" ([5], p38)
pez "sheep"	pasu- "sheep, goat"	boz	paśu "animal"		fee (< OE feoh "cattle")	Vieh "cattle"	fä "cattle"	pecus "cattle"	pekus "ox"	pastuh "shepherd"	*pek̂-u- "sheep"[6],[7]
çiya,kash "mountain"		kūh, chakād "peak/summit"	kakúd-, kakúbh- "peak/summit"				kinn "steep mountain side"	cacūmen			*kak-, *kakud- "top"[8] [9]
zîndu "alive" jiyan "to live"	gaêm [gaya]	zend[e] "alive", zî[stan] "to live", zaideh "child"	jīvati	zoi "life", zō "live"	quick	quick "bright"	kvick "quick"	vīvus "alive", vīvō "live", vīta "life"	gývas	žyznj "life", žyvój "living, alive"	*gʷih₃(u̯)-
[di][a]zan[im] "I know" zan[în] "to know"	zan-	[mi]dān[am] "I know", dān[estan] "to know"	jān[āti]	[gi]gnō[skō]	know	kennen	kunna "to be able to"	nō[scō], [co]gn[itus]	žin[au]"I know" žin[oti] "to know"	znatj "to know"	*ĝneh₃-

[edit] Vocabulary

The bulk of Kurdish vocabulary in standard Kurdish is of Iranian origin, especially of northwestern Iranian; there are also a number of Persian (southwestern) loanwords in Kurdish, entered mainly through poetry. A smaller number of loanwords come from Semitic, mainly Arabic, and are mostly religious terms. Yet, a smaller group of loanwords which are of Armenian, Caucasian and Turkic origins are used in standard Kurdish, besides some European words. There are also a number of Kurdish words with no clear etymology.

[edit] Writing system

The Kurdish language uses three different writing systems. In Iran and Iraq it is written using a modified version of the Arabic alphabet (and more recently, sometimes with the Latin alphabet in Iraqi Kurdistan). In Turkey and Syria, it is written using the Latin alphabet. As an example, see the following online news portal published in Iraqi Kurdistan. [10] Also see the VOA News site in Kurdish. [11] Kurdish in the former USSR is written with a modified Cyrillic alphabet. There is also a proposal for a unified international recognised Kurdish alphabet based on ISO-8859-1^[27] called Yekgirtú.

[edit] Dictionaries

[edit] Kurdish-only dictionaries

• Wîkîferheng (Kurdish Wiktionary)
• Husein Muhammed: Soranî Kurdish - Kurmancî Kurdish dictionary (2005)
• Khal, Sheikh Muhammad, Ferhengî Xal (Khal Dictionary), Kamarani Press, Sulaymaniya, 3 Volumes,

Vol. I, 1960, 380 p.

Vol. II, 1964, 388 p.

Vol. III, 1976, 511 p.

[edit] Kurdish-English dictionaries

• Rashid Karadaghi, The Azadi English-Kurdish Dictionary
• Chyet, Michael L., Kurdish Dictionary: Kurmanji-English, Yale Language Series, U.S., 2003 (896 pages) (see ^[28])
• Abdullah, S. and Alam, K., English-Kurdish (Sorani) and Kurdish (Sorani)-English Dictionary, Star Publications / Languages of the World Publications, India, 2004 ^[29]
• Awde, Nicholas, Kurdish-English/English-Kurdish Dictionary and Phrasebook, Hippocrene Books Inc., U.S., 2004 ^[30]
• Raman : English-Kurdish (Sorani) Dictionary, Pen Press Publishers Ltd, UK, 2003, (800 pages) ^[31]
• Saadallah, Salah, English-Kurdish Dictionary, Avesta/Paris Kurdish Institute, Istanbul, 2000, (1477 pages)
• Amindarov, Aziz, Kurdish-English/English-Kurdish Dictionary, Hippocrene Books Inc., U.S., 1994 ^[32]
• Rizgar, Baran (M. F. Onen), Kurdish-English/English-Kurdish (Kurmancî Dictionary) UK, 1993, 400 p. + 70 illustrations ^[33]

As a main program, Iranian Kurdish-speaker scholar, Hamid Hassani, is supposed to prepare a Soranî Kurdish Language Corpus, consisting of one-million words.

[edit] References

[edit] See also

• List of countries by Kurdish-speaking population
• Kurdish grammar
• Kurdish literature
• Kurdish Institute of Paris
• Kurdish Institute of Istanbul
• Kurdistan
• List of Kurdish people
• Kurdish culture
• Sorani
• Kurmanji/Bahdīnī
• [12] La Marle's site about Western Indo-Iranian languages and Minoan Crete, through Linear A script.

[edit] External links

• The Kurdish Institute of Paris - Language and Literature
• Kurdish Language by Ludwig Paul
• Kurdish Language and Linguistics
• Kurdish Institute of Istanbul
• KAL: The Kurdish Academy of Language
• Kurdish Language Academy in Iran
• Kurdish Kurdish links and language information, dictionary etc.
• Kurdish languages at the Open Directory Project
• Online Kurdish-English Dictionary
• On-line Kurdish-English Dictionary
• Online English to Kurdish to English Dictionary (By Erdal Ronahî)
• Online Kurdish-German-Kurdish Dictionary
• Online Kurdish-English Ferheng Dictionary
• Online Turkish-Kurdish-Turkish Dictionary
• http://ocw.mit.edu/OcwWeb/Linguistics-and-Philosophy/24-942Grammar-of-a-Less-Familiar-
• Comparison between alphabets used in Kurdish
• Jeunesse Kurde - Kurdish Youth Community (fr,kd,tr,en)
• Gorani Influence on Central Kurdish

[edit] Religious texts

• Holy Bible in Kurdish
• New Testament in Soranî Kurdish, International Bible Society

[edit] Kurdish broadcast programs

• Voice of America, Kurdish Service
• Zayele, Radio Sweden
• SBS Radio's Kurdish Language Program, Australia
• "Evangeliums-Rundfunk of Germany" (ERF)- Christian Programs in Kurdish Kurmanji, Germany
• "Evangeliums-Rundfunk of Germany" (ERF)- Christian Programs in Kurdish Sorani, Germany
• KurdSat Broadcasting Ltd., Sulaimania, Iraqi Kurdistan
• Kurdistan TV, Iraqi Kurdistan
• Zagros TV , Satellite Channel, Iraqi Kurdistan
• Tehran Kurdish Radio
• Kürtçe Müzik

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