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Gorani in its historical and linguistic context

Kommentare deaktiviert für Gorani in its historical and linguistic context

Abstract

Gorani refers alternately to a subgroup of the Iranian languages spoken in the borderlands between Iraq and Iran with small islands of speakers stippling the map from the Iranian border to Nineveh or to a literary standard used widely until the decline of the Ardalan dynasty in the 19th century. Here, we explore both these uses of the term to understand the place of Gorani varieties among the regional languages. The role of Gorani has, at times, been the local idiom of minoritized groups or a prestigious literary standard. Gorani and its speakers have substantially impacted its neighbors, including Neo-Aramaic, Southern and Central Kurdish, and Laki. It has been the chosen literary language and spoken vernacular of various religious groups. The conservative character of Gorani varieties has made it essential to understand Iranian dialectology. Here, we explore all aspects of Gorani, explicitly focusing on its diachronic and sociolinguistic developments and the history of its study.

Published in Gorani in its historical and linguistic context

Classification of the Zazaki language based on the perspectives of perceptual dialectology and comparative linguistics

Kommentare deaktiviert für Classification of the Zazaki language based on the perspectives of perceptual dialectology and comparative linguistics

Abstract:

The purpose of this article is to update existing views on the Zazaki dialectology and answer these two questions: Are the Zazas Kurds? Is Zazaki Kurdish? To answer this question, methods of comparative linguistics and perceptual dialectology are used. The first part of this article deals with the background of Zaza studies. The second part, based on the perspectives of perceptual dialectology, attempts to provide a clear picture of the complex status of the identity of the Zazas from emic and etic perspectives. The third section focuses on comparative linguistics research and examines a number of typologically marked grammatical characteristics in several Iranian languages that are important for studying the classification of Zazaki. The last section provides a conclusion and answers the two main questions of this research.