Talk:Azerbaijani language

Grammar?

This article should include something about the Azerbaijani grammar. — Richwales (no relation to Jimbo) 19:46, 31 March 2024 (UTC)

Removing "Azeri" from article

@Tural2008: You removed the mentions of "Azeri" and "Azeri Turkic" in the introduction with the comment "Azeri word is wrong". The terms are commonly used, there’s no point removing them from the article. Please indicate why the terms are inadequate in the article with references. Pretending they don’t exist or aren’t used isn’t helping anyone. Moyogo/ (talk) 10:20, 16 May 2024 (UTC)

After all, we do not officially use such an abbreviation. Our textbooks are written in Azerbaijani or the Azerbaijani language. This abbreviation is an unattested word coined later. Tural Alisoy (talk) 10:25, 16 May 2024 (UTC)

We need some reliable sources here, folks. It seems to me that there are quite a few sources already in this article which refer to this language as "Azeri", but I (who am a non-speaker of the language) have no way of knowing how reliable these sources are (or are not). Please, let's not descend into an edit war in which people are adding and removing the word based only on their personal knowledge or understanding; please back up your knowledge with sources. — Richwales (no relation to Jimbo) 13:17, 16 May 2024 (UTC)

@Tural2008: Whether it is coined later or not or whether you used it or not, it’s used in English as a synonym for "Azerbaijani":

The Oxford dictionary of English, Oxford University Press, 2010, p. 113 (Google Books):

Azeri /əˈzɛːri/ ▸ noun (pl. Azeris) 1 a member of a Turkic people forming the majority population of Azerbaijan, and also living in Armenia and northern Iran. 2. [mass noun] the Azerbaijani language. ▸ adjective relating to the Azeris or their language. – ORIGIN from Turkish azerî.

--Moyogo/ (talk) 18:02, 16 May 2024 (UTC)

Yep. The word Azeri also predates the Turkic Azerbaijani language, making it even more irrelevant whether they use it or not. HistoryofIran (talk) 18:08, 16 May 2024 (UTC)

If this helps, Audrey L. Altstadt, The Azerbaijani Turks: power and identity under Russian rule, Hoover Institution Press, 1992, p. ix (Google Books):

The Turks of Azerbaijan were classified as Tatars or Muslims in the imperial period and as Turks until 1937. Thereafter, they and their language were called Azerbaijani by Soviet or “Azeri” by some Western sources. An apparently Iranian language called Azeri was spoken in Atropaten; thus, the term is inappropriate for today's Azerbaijani Turks and their language.* Some historians in Soviet Azerbaijan have suggested the most correct usage is “Azerbaijan Türkleri,” for it reflects both ethnicity and location. I have used this term, translated as Azerbaijani Turk, occasionally using only Azerbaijani or Turk for brevity. In the language of the Turks, there is no distinction between Turkish (in Russian, turetskii) and Turkic (tiurkskii). The former has been used, following Russian imperial and Soviet precedent, to refer to Turks of the Ottoman Empire or the Turkish Republic; the latter, to Turks elsewhere. Because of the artificiality of this distinction in a cultural or ethnic sense, I have used Turkish throughout.

*From Istoriia Azerbaidzhana/Azarbayjan Tarikhi (Baku, 1958-1963), 1:49.

So it seems that is one of the problems some people have with "Azeri". --Moyogo/ (talk) 06:00, 17 May 2024 (UTC)

Or also, Sooman Noah Lee, A Grammar of Iranian Azerbaijani (thesis), University of Sussex, 1996, p. 1 (University of Sussex Library):

The Azerbaijani language is spoken by the Azerbaijani people. They are known by several names depending on the location and context, such as ‘Azeri (Azəri in Azerbaijani)’, ‘Azeri Turk (Azəri Türk)’, ‘Turk (Türk)¹’, as well as ‘Azerbaijani (Azərbaycanlı)’. These names can be used interchangeably; however, ‘Azerbaijani’ is considered the most proper. The noun ‘Azerbaijani [ɑzɛɾbɑjˈdʒɑni]’, in effect, has two meanings: ‘the Azerbaijani people’ and ‘the language spoken by the people’, though sometimes the language is called ‘the Azerbaijani language (Azərbaycan dili or Azərbaycanca)’.

¹ ‘Turk’ is an Iranian name for the Azerbaijani people and ‘Turki’ for the language.

--Moyogo/ (talk) 07:57, 17 May 2024 (UTC)