Azerbaijani language
| Azerbaijani | |
|---|---|
| Azərbaycan dili Азәрбајҹан дили آذربایجان دیلی | |
| Pronunciation | /azærbajʤan dili/ |
| Native to | Republic of Azerbaijan & Iran, also in parts of neighboring countries such as Georgia, Iraq, Russia, Turkey, and Ukraine |
Native speakers | 25 million [1] |
| Latin alphabet in Azerbaijan, Perso-Arabic script in Iran, and, formerly, Cyrillic alphabet (Azerbaijani variants) | |
| Official status | |
Official language in | Republic of Azerbaijan (northern dialect), Iraq (southern dialect; official in areas where Iraqi Turkmen form a majority) |
| Language codes | |
| ISO 639-1 | az |
| ISO 639-2 | aze |
| ISO 639-3 | Variously:aze – Azerbaijani (generic)azj – North Azerbaijaniazb – South Azerbaijaniqxq – Qashqa'islq – Salchuq |
| Part of a series on |
| Azerbaijanis |
|---|
| Culture |
| Traditional areas of settlement |
| Diaspora |
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| Persecution |
The Azerbaijani language, also called Azeri, Azari, Azeri Turkish, or Azerbaijani Turkish, is the official language of the Republic of Azerbaijan.
It is called Azərbaycan dili in the Republic of Azerbaijan. Iranian Azerbaijanis often call it Azari or Türki Azari. Some dialects of the language are spoken in many parts of Iran, most notably in Iranian Azerbaijan, where it is the dominant language and a lingua franca.[3] Iran is home to the majority of Azeri speakers in the world. The language is also spoken in Russia's Republic of Dagestan, south-eastern Georgia, northern Iraq, and eastern Turkey.
Estimates of the CIA factbook gives the number of speakers around 25 million.[4] It is a Turkic language of the Oghuz branch, closely related to Turkish and also historically influenced by Persian and Arabic.
In addition, Azerbaijani is mutually intelligible with other Oghuz languages, which include the Turkish language as it is spoken in Turkey, the Caucasus, Cyprus, the Balkans, Iraq, Syria, and Western Europe, as well as the Turkmen language.
History and evolution
- For the languages spoken in Azerbaijan before the Turks' arrival, see:
The Azerbaijani language of today is based on the Oghuz language, spread to Southwestern Asia in the course of the medieval Turkic migration, heavily influenced by Persian and Arabic.
It gradually supplanted the previous Iranian languages—Tat, Azari, and Middle Persian in northern Iran, and a variety of Caucasian languages in the Caucasus, particularly Udi, and had become the dominant language before the time of the Safavid dynasty; however, minorities in both the Republic of Azerbaijan and Iran continue to speak the earlier Iranian languages to this day, and Middle- and New Persian loanwords are numerous in Azerbaijani.
The historical development of Azerbaijani can be divided into two major periods: early (ca. 16th to 18th century) and modern (18th century to present). Old Azerbaijani differs from its descendant in that it contained a much greater amount of Persian, Arabic, and Ottoman Turkish loanwords, phrases and syntactic elements. Early writings in Azerbaijani also demonstrate lingustic interchangeability between Oghuz and Kypchak elements in many aspects (such as pronouns, case endings, participles, etc...). As Azerbaijani gradually moved from being merely a language of epic and lyric poetry to being also a language of journalism and scientific research, its literary version has become more or less unified and simplified with the loss of many archaic Turkic elements, bulky Iranisms and Ottomanisms, and other words, expressions, and rules that failed to gain popularity among Azerbaijani-speaking masses.
Between ca. 1900 and 1930, there were several competing approaches to the unification of the national language in Azerbaijan popularized by the literati. Despite major differences, they all aimed primarily at making it easy for semiliterate masses to read and understand literature. They all criticized the overuse of Persian, Arabic, Ottoman Turkish, and European (mainly Russian) elements in both colloquial and literary language and called for a more simple and popular style.
The Russian conquest of the South Caucasus in the 19th century split the speech community across two states; the Soviet Union promoted development of the language, but set it back considerably with two successive script changes - from Perso-Arabic script to Latin and then to Cyrillic - while Iranian Azeris continued to use the Perso-Arabic script as they always had. Despite the wide use of Azerbaijani during the Soviet era, it became the official language of Azerbaijan only in 1978 (along with Georgian in Georgia and Armenian in Armenia). After independence, the Republic of Azerbaijan decided to switch again to the Latin script, following the Turkish model.
Literature
Classical literature in Azerbaijani was formed in 14th century based on the Tabrizi and Shirvani[citation needed] dialects (these dialects were used by classical Azerbaijani writers Nasimi, Fuzuli, and Khatai). Modern literature in the Republic of Azerbaijan is based on the Shirvani dialect only, while in Iran it is based on the Tabrizi one. The first newspaper in Azerbaijani, Əkinçi was published in 1875.
In mid-19th century it was taught in the schools of Baku, Ganja, Shaki, Tbilisi, and Yerevan. Since 1845, it has also been taught in the University of St. Petersburg in Russia.
Famous literary works in Azerbaijani are the Book of Dada Gorgud, the Epic of Köroğlu, translation of Layla and Majnun (Dâstân-ı Leylî vü Mecnûn), and Heydar Babaya Salam. Important poets and writers of the Azerbaijani language include Imadeddin Nasimi, Muhammed Fuzuli, Hasanoglu Izeddin, Shah Ismail I, Khurshidbanu Natavan, Mirza Fatali Akhundov, Mirza Alakbar Sabir, Bakhtiyar Vahabzade, and Mohammad Hossein Shahriar.
Distribution of native speakers
Since early last century, successive Iranian governments have avoided publishing any statistics on ethnic groups. This policy presents difficulty in providing any statistics on distribution and size of ethnicity in Iran.[citation needed]
The estimated size of all Azeri speakers within Azerbaijan and Iran combined, according to two sources, differs from 23.4 to 30 million[citation needed]. This total does not include the Azeri speakers in Iraq, Afghanistan, Turkey, Georgia, Dagestan and other smaller pockets within the Middle East and Russia. Ethnologue adds 864,000 for the speakers out of Iran and Republic of Azerbaijan.
| Source (where given) |
Total population | % Azeri | Number of speakers |
|---|---|---|---|
| CIA Facts Book on Azerbaijan | 8,587,000 | 96,6% | 8,295,042 |
| CIA Facts Book on Iran | 73,500,000 | 24% | 18,000,000 |
| 26,587,000 total |
Regions where Azerbaijani is spoken by significant group of people
- Azerbaijani (North Dialect)1
Azerbaijan, and southern Dagestan, along the Caspian coast in the southern Caucasus Mountains. Also spoken in Armenia, Estonia, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Russia (Asia), Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan.
- Azerbaijani (South Dialect) 2
East Azerbaijan and West Azerbaijan, Ardabil, Zanjan,and part of Kordestan, Hamedan, Qazvin,Markazi and Gilan provinces. Many in districts of Tehran. Some Azerbaijani-speaking groups are in Fars Province and other parts of Iran. Also spoken in Afghanistan, Azerbaijan, Iraq, Jordan, Syria, Turkey (Asia), USA.
Dialects
Despite their relatively large number, dialects of Azerbaijani do not differ substantially. Speakers of various dialects normally do not have problems understanding each other. However minor problems may occur between Azerbaijani-speakers from the Caucasus and Iran, as some of the words used by the latter that are of Persian or Arabic origin may be unknown to the former. For example, the word firqə ("political party") used by Iranian Azeris may not be understood in Azerbaijan, where the word partiya is used to describe the same object. Such phenomenon is explained by the fact that both words have been in wide use since after the split of the two speech communities in 1828.
The following list reflects only one of several perspectives on the dialectology of Azerbaijani. Some dialects may be varieties of others.
- Ardabil dialect (Ardabil and western Gilan, Iran)
- Ayrum dialect (northwestern Azerbaijan; northeastern Armenia(refactored from arm))
- Baku dialect (eastern Azerbaijan)
- Borchali dialect (southern Georgia; northern Armenia(refactored from arm))
- Derbent dialect (southern Russia)
- Gabala (Gutgashen) dialect (northern Azerbaijan)
- Ganja dialect (western Azerbaijan)
- Gazakh dialect (northwestern Azerbaijan)
- Guba dialect (northeastern Azerbaijan)
- Hamadan dialect (Hamadan, Iran)
- Karabakh dialect (central Azerbaijan)
- Karadagh dialect (East Azerbaijan and West Azerbaijan, Iran)
- Kars dialect (eastern Turkey and northwestern Armenia(refactored from arm))
- Kirkuk dialect (northern Iraq)
- Lankaran dialect (southeast Azerbaijan)
- Maragheh dialect (East Azerbaijan, Iran)
- Mughan (Salyan) dialect (central Azerbaijan)
- Nakhichevan dialect (southwestern Azerbaijan)
- Ordubad dialect (southwestern Azerbaijan; southern Armenia(refactored from arm))
- Shaki (Nukha) dialect (northern Azerbaijan)
- Shirvan (Shamakhy) dialect (eastern Azerbaijan)
- Tabriz dialect (East Azerbaijan, Iran)
- Urmia dialect (West Azerbaijan, Iran)
- Yamji dialect (West Azerbaijan, Iran)
- Yerevan dialect (central Armenia(refactored from arm))
- Zagatala-Gakh dialect (northern Azerbaijan)
- Zanjan dialect (Zanjan, Iran)
Template:Ent The denoted dialects were traditionally spoken in the given area until recent times. As a result of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict virtually all Azeris fled Armenia by 1991, which is why Azerbaijani is no longer spoken there.
Phonology
Consonants
| Bilabial | Labio- dental |
Dental | Alveolar | Post- alveolar |
Palatal | Velar | Glottal | |||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Plosives and affricates |
p | b | t | d | ʧ | ʤ | c | ɟ | k | ɡ | ||||||
| Nasals | m | n | ||||||||||||||
| Fricatives | f | v | s | z | ʃ | ʒ | x | ɣ | h | |||||||
| Approximants | l | j | ||||||||||||||
| Taps | ɾ | |||||||||||||||
- In some dialects of Nakhchivan (Azerbaijan), West Azerbaijan (Iran) and Kirkuk (Iraq), [ʦ] and [ʣ] occur as allophones of /ʧ/ and /ʤ/, and/or /c/ and /ɟ/ respectively.
- In many dialects of Azeri, /c/ is realized as [ç] when it is found in the coda position or is preceded by a voiceless consonant (as in çörək [ʧœˈɾæç] - "bread"; səksən [sæçˈsæn] - "eighty").
- /k/ appears only in words borrowed from Russian or French (spelled, as with /c/, with a k).
- /w/ exists in the Kirkuk dialect as an allophone of /v/ in Arabic loanwords.
- In the Baku dialect, /ov/ may be realised as [oʷ], and /ev/ and /œv/ as [œʷ], e.g. /ɡovurˈma/ → [ɡoʷurˈma], /sevˈda/ → [sœʷˈda], /dœvˈran/ → [dœʷˈran][citation needed]
Vowels
Vowel phonemes of Standard Azeri
Alphabets
In the Republic of Azerbaijan, Azerbaijani now officially uses the Latin alphabet, but the Cyrillic alphabet is also in wide use, while in Iran the Perso-Arabic script is used. There is a one-to-one correspondence between the Latin and Cyrillic alphabets for Azerbaijani (although the Cyrillic alphabet has a different order):
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Before 1929, Azerbaijani was only written in the Perso-Arabic script. In 1929–1938 a Latin alphabet was in use (although it was different from the one used now), from 1938 to 1991 the Cyrillic alphabet was used, and in 1991 the current Latin alphabet was introduced, although the transition to it has been rather slow. The Azerbaijani speakers in Iran have always continued to use the Perso-Arabic script, although the spelling and orthography is not yet standardized[citation needed].
The Azerbaijani language, if written in Latin, transliterates all foreign words to its own spelling. For example, "Bush" becomes "Buş", and "Schröder" becomes "Şröder".
Nomenclature
In 1992-1993, when Azerbaijan Popular Front Party was in power in Azerbaijan, the official language of Azerbaijan was renamed by the parliament to Türk dili ("Turkic"). However, since 1994 the Soviet era name of the language, Azərbaycan dili ("Azerbaijani"), has been re-established and reflected in the Constitution. Varlıq, the most important literary Azerbaijani magazine published in Iran, uses the term Türki ("Turkic" in English or "Torki" in Persian) to define Azerbaijani language. Iranian Azerbaijanis often refer to the language as Türki, distinguishing it from İstambuli Türki ("Anatolian Turkish"), the official language of Turkey. Some people also consider Azerbaijani to be a dialect of a greater Turkish language and call it Azərbaycan Türkcəsi ("Azerbaijani Turkish"), and scholars such as Vladimir Minorsky used this definition in their works. ISO and the Unicode Consortium, call the language "Azerbaijani".
See also
References
External links
- Learning Azerbaijani Site
- AZERI.org - Azerbaijan Literature and English translation
- Alphabet and Language in Transition. Entire issue of Azerbaijan International (AZER.com), Spring 2000 (8.1)
- Editorial: Azerbaijani Alphabet & Language in Transition. Azerbaijan International (AZER.com), Spring 2000 (8.1)
- Chart: Four Alphabet Changes in Azerbaijan in the 20th Century. Azerbaijan International (AZER.com), Spring 2000 (8.1)
- Chart: Changes in the Four Azerbaijan Alphabet Sequence in the 20th century. Azerbaijan International (AZER.com), Spring 2000 (8.1)
- Baku’s Institute of Manuscripts: _Early Alphabets in Azerbaijan__. Azerbaijan International (AZER.com), Spring 2000 (8.1)
- Azerbaijani Language by Ethnologue
- Azerbaijani language, alphabets and pronunciation by omniglot.com
- Pre-Islamic roots
- Azerbaijani-Turkish language in Iran by Ahmad Kasravi
- Azerbaijani and Basque with Japanese translation incl. sound file
