Gorani language

Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
This article is about the language spoken by Kurds. For the Slavic dialect, see Gorani dialect.
"Gurani language" redirects here. Not to be confused with the Guarani language.

Gorani
گۆرانی
Goranî
Garmian and Nineveh)
Native speakers
300,000 (2007)[1]
DialectsHewramî
Şebekî[3]
Sarlî[3]
Bacelanî[4]
Kurdish alphabet
Language codes
ISO 639-3Variously:
hac – Gorani (Gurani)
sdb – Shabaki
sdf – Sarli
Glottologgura1251
ELP
Linguasphere58-AAA-b

Gorani (

Kurdish dialect by many researchers.[6][7][8][9] The speakers of Gorani call their language Kurdish.[10] Gorani is a literary language for many Kurds.[11]

Gorani is spoken in Iraq and Iran and has four dialects: Bajelani, Hawrami, and Sarli, some sources also include the

Central Kurdish and Southern Kurdish.[14]

Gorani had an estimated 180,000 speakers in Iran in 2007 and 120,000 speakers in Iraq as well in 2007 for a total of 300,000 speakers. Ethnologue reports that the language is threatened in both countries and that speakers residing in Iraq includes all adults and some children, however it does not mention if speakers are shifting to Sorani or not. Many speakers of Gorani in Iran also speak Sorani, Persian, as well as Southern Kurdish. Most speakers in Iraq also speak Sorani, while some also speak Mesopotamian Arabic.[15]

Etymology

The name Goran appears to be of Indo-Iranian origin. The name may be derived from the old Avestan word, gairi, which means mountain.[16]

Literature

Main article: Ardalan § Gorani Culture in Ardalan

Under the independent rulers of Ardalan (9th–14th / 14th–19th century), with their capital latterly at Sanandaj, Gorani became the vehicle of a considerable corpus of poetry. Gorani was and remains the first language of the scriptures of the Ahl-e Haqq sect, or

Yarsanism, centered on Gahvara
. Prose works, in contrast, are hardly known. The structure of Gorani verse is very simple and monotonous. It consists almost entirely of stanzas of two rhyming half-verses of ten syllables each, with no regard to the quantity of syllables.

Names of forty classical poets writing in Gorani are known, but the details of the lives and dates are unknown for the most part. Perhaps the earliest writer is

Khulam Rada Khan Arkawazi. One of the last great poets to complete a book of poems (divan) in Gurani is Mawlawi Tawagozi south of Halabja
.

Shirin and Farhad, Haft Khwan-i Rostam and Sultan Jumjuma. Manuscripts of these works are currently preserved in the national libraries of Berlin, London, and Paris
.

Example of Gorani poetry

Şîrîn û Xesrew written in 1740 by Khana Qubadî.

[17]

Dialects

Bajelani

Bajelani is a Gorani dialect[3] with about 59,000 speakers, predominately around Mosul,[18] near Khanaqin and near the Khosar valley.[6]

Hawrami

Hawrami (هەورامی; Hewramî) also known as Avromani, Awromani or Horami, is a Gorani dialect and is regarded as the most archaic one.

Hawraman region, a mountainous region located in western Iran (Iranian Kurdistan) and northeastern Iraq (Iraqi Kurdistan). There are around 23,000 speakers, and it was classed as "definitely endangered" by UNESCO in 2010.[20]

Due to concerns with the decline of Hawrami speakers, as people move away from the Hawraman region to cities like Erbil, Jamal Habibullah Faraj Bedar, a retired teacher from Tawela, decided to translate the Qur'an from Arabic into Hawrami. The translation took two and a half months and 1000 copies of the publication were printed in Tehran.[20]

Sarli

Sarli is spoken in northern Iraq by a cluster of villages

Kurdish, Turkish and Persian influences, like its neighbours Bajelani and Shabaki.[27]

Shabaki

Main article: Shabaki language

Phonology

Consonants

Labial Dental Alveolar Post-
alveolar 		Velar Uvular Pharyngeal Glottal
Nasal m n
Plosive aspirated pʰ tʰ t͡ʃʰ kʰ q [ʔ]
voiced b d d͡ʒ ɡ
Fricative
voiceless
 		f s ʃ x ħ h
voiced (v) ð z ʒ (ʁ) (ʕ)
Lateral plain l
velarized ɫ
Rhotic tap ɾ
trill r
Approximant w j

All voiceless plosives and affricates are aspirated.

  • A glottal stop [ʔ] may be heard before a word-initial vowel, but is not phonemic.
  • Sounds /ʕ ʁ/ only occur in loanwords.
  • /x/ can also be heard as [χ] among different dialects.
  • /q/ can also be aspirated as [qʰ].
  • The voiced /d/ may be lenited in post-vocal positions, and occur as a voiced dental approximant [ð̞]. In the Nawsud dialects, /d/ can be heard as an alveolar approximant sound [ɹ], and may also be devoiced when occurring in word-final positions as [ɹ̥].
  • In the Nawsud and Nodša dialects, a word-initial /w/ can be heard as a [v] or a labialized [vʷ].
  • /n/ when preceding velar consonants, is heard as a velar nasal [ŋ].

Vowels

Front Central Back
Close i u
Near-close ɪ ʊ
Close-mid e o
Mid ə
Open-mid ɛ ɔ
Near-open æ
Open a
  • Sounds /æ ə/ both can be realized as an open-mid [ɛ].[28]

Hawrami Grammar

Nouns

  • Hawrami distinguishes between two genders and two cases; Masculine & Feminine, and Nominative & Oblique. The two cases are otherwise referred to as the Direct and Indirect Cases.

Gender distinctions in nouns are indicated by a combination of final stress and vowel/consonant ending. Masculine nouns in the nominative form are indicated by a stressed "-O", -Δ, "-U", "-E", "-A" and all consonant endings. Feminine nouns are indicated by an unstressed "-E", "-Î", a stressed "-Ê" and rarely, a stressed "-A".

There are 3 declensions. The declensions of each gender will be demonstrated as an example.

First Declension (Masculine Consonant Ending; Feminine Short Unstressed Vowel Ending)

  • Masculine : Kur (Boy)
  • Feminine : Xatune (Queen)

Second Declension (Masculine Stressed Short Vowel Ending; Feminine Stressed "-Ê” Ending)

  • Masculine : Yane (House)
  • Feminine : Namê (Name)

Third Declension (Stressed Long "-A" Ending)

  • Masculine : Pîya (Man)
  • Feminine : Dega (Village)

Source[29]

First Declension Masculine Feminine
Nominative Singular -ø -e,î
Oblique Singular -î -ê
Nominative Plural -ê -ê,î
Oblique Plural -'a -'a
Second Declension Masculine Feminine
Nominative Singular -'e,-'î,-'o,-'u -'ê
Oblique Singular -'ey,-'î,-'oy,-'uy -'ê
Nominative Plural -'ê,-'ê,-'oê,-'uê -'ê
Oblique Plural -'a,-'a,-o'a,-,u'a -'a
Third Declension Masculine Feminine
Nominative Singular -'a -'a
Oblique Singular -'ay -'ê
Nominative Plural -'ê -'ê
Oblique Plural -ay'a -ay'a

Note: " ' " indicates syllable followed will be stressed

In Hawrami, definiteness and indefiniteness is marked by two independent suffixes, "-ew", and "-(a)ka". These suffixes decline for case and gender. The indefinite suffix "-ew" is declined by the first declension pattern while the definite suffix "-(a)ka" follows the second declension paradigm

Personal Pronouns

Singular Plural
First Person Min Êm'e
Second Person To Şim'e
Third Person Masculine Feminine Plural
Nominative Að̞ 'Aðe 'Aðê
Oblique 'Aðî 'Aðê Aðîş'a

Gallery

  • Partial tree of Indo-European languages.[30]
    Partial tree of Indo-European languages.[30]

References

  1. ^ Gorani (Gurani) at Ethnologue (25th ed., 2022) Closed access icon
    Shabaki at Ethnologue (25th ed., 2022) Closed access icon
    Sarli at Ethnologue (25th ed., 2022) Closed access icon
  2. ^ A Working Classification
  3. ^
    Iranica Online
    . Retrieved 30 May 2019.
  4. Iranica Online
    . Retrieved 30 May 2019.
  5. ISBN 978-1538110508
    .
  6. ^ a b c Michiel Leezenberg (1993). "Gorani Influence on Central Kurdish: Substratum or Prestige Borrowing?" (PDF). ILLC - Department of Philosophy, University of Amsterdam.
  7. ^ G. Tavadze (2019). "Spreading of the Kurdish language dialects and writing systems used in the middle east". Bulletin of the Georgian National Academy of Sciences. 13 (1): 170–174. Retrieved 30 April 2020.
  8. ^ Jaffer Sheyholislami (2015). "Language Varieties of the Kurds". Retrieved 30 April 2020. {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help)
  9. ISBN 9781921987489
    . Retrieved 30 April 2020.
  10. ISSN 0240-8910. {{cite journal}}: |issue= has extra text (help
    )
  11. S2CID 148611170
    .
  12. ISBN 978-1511523493
    .
  13. ^ "چمن‌آرا، ب، "درآمدی بر ادب حماسی و پهلوانی کُردی با تکیه بر شاهنامه کُردی"، جستارهای ادبی، سال چهل و چهارم، بهار ۱۳۹۰، شماره ۱۷۲".
  14. ^ Meri, Josef W., Medieval Islamic Civilization: A–K, index. p. 444
  15. ^ "Gorani". Ethnologue. Retrieved 1 December 2023.
  16. ^ Peterson, Joseph H. "Avestan Dictionary".
  17. ^ Xanay Qubadî, Şîrîn û Xesrew, (Saxkirdnewey Ferheng û Pîşekî: Muhemmed Mela Kerîm), Korrî Zanyarî Kurd, Bexda 1975.
  18. ^ "Bajelani". Ethnologue. Retrieved 30 May 2019.
  19. Iranica Online
    . Retrieved 30 May 2019.
  20. ^ a b Menmy, Dana Taib (31 January 2020). "Teacher translates Quran to save endangered Kurdish dialect". Al-Monitor. Retrieved 3 February 2020.
  21. ISBN 9789754281620
    .
  22. ISBN 9781136892660
    .
  23. ^ Sinor, Denis (1 January 1956). Proceedings of the Twenty-Third International Congress of Orientalists, Cambridge, 21st-28th August, 1954. Royal Asiatic Society. p. 178.
  24. ^ "Sarli". Ethnologue. Retrieved 7 November 2023.
  25. ^ a b "Sarli". Ethnologue. Retrieved 4 March 2017.
  26. ISBN 9789754281620
    .
  27. ^ Nations, League of; Wirsén, Einar Thure af (1 January 1925). Question de la frontière entre la Turquie et l'Irak (in French). Imprimeries réunies, s.a.
  28. ^ Mahmoudveysi, Parvin; Bailey, Denise (2018). Hawrāmī of western Iran. Geoffrey Haig and Geoffrey Khan (eds.), The Languages and Linguistics of Western Asia: Berlin: DeGruyter Mouton. pp. 533–568.
  29. ^ D. N., Mackenzie (1966). "Hawramani - Luhoni" (PDF).
  30. ^ "worldhistory". worldhistory.com by Multiple authors. Retrieved 19 December 2021.

Textbooks

External links

Gorani language test of Wikipedia at Wikimedia Incubator
Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Gorani_language&oldid=1217922133"