Talk:Tajik language

Language

Tajiki is a dialect of Persian. Tajiki is not a seperate language. I speak Persian, (Iranian) and I understand "Tajiki" perfectly.Dariush4444 20:49, 18 February 2007 (UTC)

Interesting if true. - Francis Tyers · 22:19, 18 February 2007 (UTC)

About the mutual intelligibility, it is true. As far as I can recall, nobody argues about the mutual intelligibility of Tajiki and other variants of Persian (even illiterate Iranians can understand Tajik songs and vice versa). However, some sources (such as Ethnologue) don't use the mutual intelligibility criterion in the clasification of languages and dialects. Jahangard 04:54, 19 February 2007 (UTC)

Mutual intelligibility is a tricky thing, as it changes dependent on geographical location (dialect continuum), I'm not aware of any sources that use this to define language / dialect. The most widely used criterion is the self-identification of the speakers of the language, which is why we have Serbian language, Croatian language, Bosnian language, and possibly Montenegrin language. You might say "But Serbian is just Croatian", or "Serbian and Croatian are dialects of Serbo-Croatian", but really it doesn't matter. What the speakers themselves think is what matters. - Francis Tyers · 08:32, 19 February 2007 (UTC)

Tajik people themselves call their language, "Farsi" (Persian). That is the same as in Iran, Afghanistan, other parts of Central Asia, The Caucauses, and the Persian Gulf. We all understand each other because we speak the SAME language. The name, "Tajik" is more of a national term referring to the country not their culture or language. Dariush4444 18:37, 20 February 2007 (UTC)

I'm Iranian, I think "Farsi" subject is best choose to explain these languages, many subject should be joined. "Iranian Language" should explain Iran aria, and "Tajik language" for Tajik aria but "Farsi(persian language)" must be include all of them. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Mmehdi.g (talk • contribs) 21:51, 2 April 2007 (UTC).

As a Tajik, I grew up learning that we are part of the larger umbrella of the Dari/Parsi language, but that Tajiki was distinct. My entire extended family and all of my Tajik friends refer to our language as Tajiki first, although sometimes calling it Porsii Tojiki (Tajiki Persian). When communicating with Iranian Farsi speakers, I have to significantly slow down my speech and change a lot of words and even grammatical constructions to be understood. Even then, with certain technical terms or even household objects (the term for "rolling pin", for example), we have to switch to English to understand each other. As other users have acknowledged, the definition of language vs. dialect is subject to much debate, but I think that Tajiki is separate enough to merit its own article. Siyovush (talk) 19:02, 19 February 2008 (UTC)

Macedonian language

Futher to, and in support of the Iranians who lived in Tajikistan, just below me, I want to make a comment on the so-caled 'Macedonian' language. I am Bulgarian and can say the same about the Macedonian language. Namely, it is a Serbianized Bulgarian dialect which was created on a single date, in 1945, and given an official status in Tito's multi-ethnic Yugoslav communist federation, which was designed to follow the model of the 'Big Brother', the USSR. Since then, the (previously ethnic Bulgarian) population in the new People's Republic of Macedonia, was declared 'Macedonian', those who opposed the denationalization were sent to 'correction' labour camps, until the goal of creating a separate 'Macedonian' national identity was more or less achieved. Its primary target was to make Bulgaria weaker and to prevent it from controlling the strategically important road Belgrade - Thessaloniki. The BIG Brother, or USSR, itself was the place of a number of such national experiments, and a series of artificial languages were created for political reasons: Moldavian, a Romanian dialect, Karelian, a Finnish dialect, Tajik, a Persian dialect, Buryatian, a Mongol dialect, and even Belarusian or White Russian, which is a Russian dialect, although with a different historical development (This was an anti-Russian move taken by Lenin and the Bolsheviks in 1918, let's not forget that they feared and hated the Great Russian imperialism and the memory of Great Russia just as much as any foreign imperialism). Georgi Stojchev, Sofia

Iranian

I as an Iranian have lived in Tajikistan. They speak exactly the same language as ours in Iran with a little dialectical differences, not as different as some other Persian dialects inside Iran. Tajiks locally call their language Persian too. To give that dialect a separate name was a Russian fabrication. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 62.234.145.72 (talk • contribs) 15:29, 19 August 2004

Most of Iranians ethnic language is not so-called Persian, which in fact should be named Tajik or Dari. Their language is Turkish, Kurdish, Gilish( Gileki), Balochi, Arabic, Turkmen,Talish,Luri,etc.

This is very interesting. Unfortunately i don't know Persian, but i would like to ask a question, if anyone who knows Persian reads this: The language of Tajikistan is written with Cyrillic letters. Did you try to read it? Can you understand it when you read it? It seems to me that this alphabet suits this language better than Arabic, because its grammar is Indo-European and not Semitic. Also, literacy in Tajikistan is almost 100% and only 80% in Iran - according to CIA World Factbook). Now i think that the Latin alphabet (like UniPers) would be best, but even Cyrillic seems better suited for Persian than the Arabic. I'd like to hear an opinion of someone who really knows Persian on this matter.--Amir E. Aharoni 21:54, 13 November 2005 (UTC)

I'm an Iranian and a native persian speaker. As to your first question: yes, I've tried to read some Tajik websites and they were pretty well understandable to me. But as you may probably know, persian speakers in Afghanistan and Tajikistan have a markedly different pronunciation from persian speakers in Iran, namely what Afghans and Tajiks pronounce like "ee" as in "deed", Iranians pronounce like 'e' as in "bed". Tajik alphabet is basically a transliteration of Tajiks' pronunciation with Cyrillic alphabet and so Tajiki texts would read somehow unusual to an Iranian speaker who has learned Cyrillic in the context of Russian. With respect to your second question, I think Arabic script doesn't even suit Arabic language itself. It is cursive and worse yet, it omits short vowels altogether. But IMO Latin alphabet is better suited for persian because a large percent of speakers, at least in Iran, are familiar with it in the context of English, while a tiny percent of Iranians know Russian and hence Cyrillic script. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.98.186.40 (talk • contribs) 19:58, 24 November 2005

I'm Iranian I don't think it is good idea because if we forget this alphabet it is more likely we forget 1300 year scripts and culture. I think some changes are necessary but this is big step. (مهدی 22:09, 2 April 2007 (UTC))

I am not a speaker of either language/dialect. Your post comes in the spirit of Ataturk and the new alphabet for Turkish. However, literacy would probably not be affected by a script change. Literacy issues do not stem from the script used, they stem from lack of proper education. Additionally, one could argue that Iran is being more reasonable with their estimation of illiteracy than Tajikistan (in line with propaganda). Of course, I can't verify the numbers you've cited right now, but it could also have to do with gender inequity in smaller villages in Iran (though I doubt "Glorious Soviet Equality" could totally obliterate generations of religion-based gender roles/rights in Tajik, so that might not be the issue either).

The issue with script change is that we don't see perfect literacy in Brazil, though Roman script is used. Though I have heard the argument that the Arabic script was not well suited to Farsi phonology, look at English! You might as well consider all of our words (or at least morphemes) as ideograms like Chinese. Yet, literacy can (and cannot) be very high in English speaking communities - but again that depends on socio-economic factors. 74.233.115.23 (talk) 20:40, 15 August 2010 (UTC)Jim

Persian

I am from Tajikistan living in US. I listen to Persian news from Iran and I will tell you this " Tajik is not a language it's a Persian dialect same as Irish English and American English". All of us Iranians, Tajiks and Afghans may have different dialects but all of us can communicate in formal Persian. (Language of Shahnoma). By the way in constitution of Tajikistan it states that official language is Tajik and in prentices it has (Farsi).—Preceding unsigned comment added by 137.197.224.14 (talk • contribs) 12:50, 12 March 2006

Please sign your comments. Bidabadi 20:19, 7 April 2006 (UTC)

Mutual intelligibility

however, a transcribed Tajik text can in general easily be read and understood by an Afghan or Iranian Persian speaker, and vice versa. The common origin of the two languages is underscored by the Tajiks' claim to such famous writers as Omar Khayyám, Firdausi, and Alisher Navoi.

Although I believe it, we could do with a source for that. - FrancisTyers 18:18, 27 May 2006 (UTC)

Table of basic words

Can someone please fill the first row in this table with Tajik words instead of Albanian?--Nixer 15:05, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

done! Tājik 18:29, 13 October 2006 (UTC)

Persian	māh	now	mādar	xwāhar	shab	damāgh	sēh	sīāh/tārīk	surx	zard	sabz	gurg
Other Indo-European languages
English	month	new	mother	sister	night	nose	three	black	red	yellow	green	wolf
Latin	mēnsis	novus	māter	soror	nox	nasus	trēs	āter, niger	ruber	flāvus, gilvus	viridis	lupus
Italian	mese	nuovo	madre	sorella	notte	naso	tre	nero	rosso	giallo	verde	lupo
German	Monat	neu	Mutter	Schwester	Nacht	Nase	drei	schwarz	rot	gelb	grün	Wolf
Portuguese	mês	novo	mãe	irmã	noite	nariz	três	negro	vermelho	amarelo	verde	lobo
Spanish	mes	nuevo	madre	hermana	noche	nariz	tres	negro	rojo	amarillo	verde	lobo
Romanian	luna	nou/noi	mamă	soră	noapte	nas	trei	negru	roşu	galben	verde	lup
Welsh	mis	newydd	mam	chwaer	nos	trwyn	tri	du (/di/)	coch, rhudd	melyn	gwyrdd, glas	blaidd
Polish	miesiąc	nowy	matka	siostra	noc	nos	trzy	czarny	czerwony	żółty	zielony	wilk
Latvian	mēnesis	jauns	māte	māsa	nakts	deguns	trīs	melns	sarkans	dzeltens	zaļš	vilks
Lithuanian	mėnuo	naujas	motina	sesuo	naktis	nosis	trys	juoda	raudona	geltona	žalias	vilkas
Bulgarian	месец mesets	нов nov	майка maika	сестра sestra	нощ nosht	нос nos	три tri	черен cheren	червен cherven	жълт zhălt	зелен zelen	вълк vălk
Russian	месяц mesăts	новый novyi	мать mat'	сестра sestra	ночь noch	нос nos	три tri	чёрный chornyi	красный krasnyi	жёлтый zholtyi	зелёный zelonyi	волк volk

• I think it would make some sense to fill in some Persian words, too, since Tajik is closely related. 84.202.199.101 19:21, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

Three (seh) as number sample is not suitable but look at six (shesh). (مهدی 22:19, 2 April 2007 (UTC))

Pamir Languages and Tajik

This article identifies several Pamir languages as dialects of Tajik. This is an opinion held by Tajik nationalists, but not by the Pamiri people of Gorno-Badakhshan or by linguists. I'm going to make changes to reflect this.—Preceding unsigned comment added by David Straub (talk • contribs)

Hit it! :) - FrancisTyers · 10:44, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

Italics in Cyrillics

A guideline on whether or not to italicize Cyrillics (and all scripts other than Latin) is being debated at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style (text formatting)#Italics in Cyrillic and Greek characters. - - Evv 16:21, 13 October 2006 (UTC)

• so-called Persian language is not related to the Persian Tribe who established the Persian Empire by the aid of some other tribes, particularly Medians,eventually demolished by Alexander the Great. And also the Geographical origion of this language is not the residence area of Persians, situated in the South of "Iran" and locally named "FARS". The geographical origion of this language is the "Central Asia". That is why all pioneer poets of this language are from this area, mainly situated in Afghanistan, Uzbakistan and Tajikistan. The original speakers of this language,that speak it more perfectly than "Iranians", are called TAJIK. Therefore, "Persian" or "Farsi" is a wrong name for this language.

Vowels

Tajik vowels
	Front	Central	Back
High	и [i] ӣ [i]		у [u], ю [ju]
Mid	э [e], е [je]		ӯ [o]
Low	а [a], я [ja]		о [ɒ] ё [jɒ]

"In the Tajik language, three vowel positions are distinguished: front — и, э, а; back — у, о, and a vowel of indeterminate position — ӯ. Among the front vowels, и — high, э — mid, а — low. Among the back vowels, у — is high, о — mid. The central vowel ӯ is also mid in tongue-height, like о, only more close; i.e. during its articulation the tongue is raised a bit higher than with о. All the front vowels are unrounded, all the back and central vowels are rounded." (Rastougeva 1954)

Perry (2005) gives the following vowel table:

Tajik vowels
	Front	Central	Back
High	и [i]		у [u]
Mid	э [e]	ӯ [u̇]	о [o]
Low	а [a]

Windfuhr in Comrie, B (ed.) The World's Major Languages gives the following table:

Tajik      i  e    u  ů   a o
          ┌↑┐ ↑   ┌↑┐ ↑   ↑ ↑
Early NP  i ī ē   u ū ō   a ā
          ↓ ↓ ↓   ↓ ↓ ↓   ↓ ↓
Afghan    e i ē   o u ō   a ā
          ↓ └↓┘   ↓ └↓┘   ↓ ↓
Iranian   e  ī    o  ū    a ā

Needless to say, I don't believe that giving ӯ as /o/ and о as /ɒ/ is correct, as these are identical with Modern Iranian Persian. I will change the table back to the table as given in Perry (2005), and await further comment. - Francis Tyers · 23:49, 16 February 2007 (UTC)

My info was from the Writing Systems of the World. It includes the Tajik alphabet with each phoneme in Tajik in IPA. Your Comrie table is not in IPA, so the exact phonetic transcription is unknown. I will revert your edit because the table lists the Tajik phonemes with relation to the writing system. For example, Persian 4 is [tʃæhɒr] while in Tajik it is [tʃɒr] not [tʃor]. Remember too the Tajik alphabet is in Cyrillic and it uses Cyrillic conventions. Does your article have it in IPA? I will have to go to the library and take some more looks. I took a look at the German wikipedia which has references: http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tadschikische_Sprache I am not sure that the fricatives are uvular that I have written down, but I do as I said before need to read through more sources again. lol Azalea_pomp

The Perry reference (Tajik Persian Reference Grammar) has it in IPA, and all references I have agree (Rastorgueva, 1954; Perry, 2005; Windfuhr, 1987; Lazard, 1956) that о is mid and not low. I'll leave your edit for now, but if you could provide further sources to back up your claim I'd be grateful.

• Lazard, G. (1956) "Charactères distinctifs de la language Tadjik". Bulletin de la Societe Linguistique de Paris. 52. pp. 117--186
• Windfuhr, G. (1987) in Comrie, B. (ed.) "Persian". The World's Major Languages. pp. 523--546
• Perry, J. R. (2005) A Tajik Persian Reference Grammar (Boston : Brill) ISBN 90-04-14323-8
• Rastorgueva, V. (1963) A Short Sketch of Tajik Grammar (Netherlands : Mouton) ISBN 0-933070-28-4

Sorry that some of the references aren't complete, but you should be able to find them with the information I've given. It is very regretful that Windfuhr, Lazard and Rastorgueva do not use IPA, in this case it would have been cleared up much sooner. - Francis Tyers · 10:18, 17 February 2007 (UTC)

I've removed the orthography from the vowel table. This may or may not be a temporary situation. I believe that Writing Systems of the World may gloss over the situation with Cyrillic that, although in languages like Russian the iotating vowels have a unique function, in other (non slavic) languages, these are generally extra letters that could just as easily be replaced by й+V where V is any of the other six vowels. Even if Tajik did have such diphthongs, the general convention is to not put diphthongs in the table like that but separate.

I could also remove the orthography from the consonant table, but I believe that the grapheme-to-phoneme ratio is pretty much 1:1. I hope this doesn't complicate the other issue regarding Tajik vowels. Ƶ§œš¹ _{[aɪm ˈfɻɛ̃ⁿdˡi]} 20:20, 17 February 2007 (UTC)

The orthography for vowels can be explained separately without much problem, although I don't see a problem with leaving the main six, without the iotated versions. Agree with the consonant table. - Francis Tyers · 20:54, 17 February 2007 (UTC)

I am curious what would be [u̇] be in IPA? Azalea_pomp

I am too, any suggestions? - Francis Tyers · 04:24, 18 February 2007 (UTC)

I will scour the sources at the library this week and see if I can find an answer. Azalea_pomp

Cool thanks. I'll see if I can dig up anything too. - Francis Tyers · 22:39, 18 February 2007 (UTC)

About the vowels

Based on what I hear on Tajik mass media (both governmental, such as Tajik TV, and nongovermental such as ozodi.org), I think the vowels are as this:

Tajik vowels
	Front	Central	Back
High	и [i,ɪ] ӣ [iː]		у [u], ю [ju]
Mid	э [eː], е [eː]		ӯ [oː,ʊː]
Low	а [a,æ], я [ja,jæ],		о [ɒː] ё [jɒː]

"и", "у", "а" are short vowels and "е", "э", "о", "ӯ", "ӣ" are long vowels ("е" and "э" are essentially the same, "э" is used at the begining of the word and "е" is used elsewhere). I don't put this table in the article, because it's somehow original research, and it partially contradicts the tables given by Perry and Windfuhr. However, I wonder if they really have listened to the native speakers, or they have just used the written sources. I know that Windfuhr is an expert in the history of Persian language and also has done many works on the Persian dialects inside Iran, but I think on the Tajik phonology, he has used second-hand sources. Jahangard 05:18, 19 February 2007 (UTC)

Your vowel table matches the one used in The Writing Systems of the World which is an academic sources and it uses IPA. I will look at more sources this week and hopefully have something. Azalea_pomp

I should mention that this table is not valid for Russian loanwords, or Russion parts of a word. For example, most of Tajik last names end with "ов" (under the influence of Russion), which is pronounced as "ov" (not "ɒːv"). As an example, for Davlatmand Kholov, his last name, Xолов, is pronounced as [χɒːlov]. Jahangard 08:43, 19 February 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for the information. That is very interesting. I am surprised it wasn't spelled: Холӯв. Azalea_pomp

For Russian loanwords and Russian parts of words, they use Russian spelling. Jahangard 04:29, 20 February 2007 (UTC)

• Jahangard, honestly, I've no idea how you're able to hear /ɒ/ in Tajik. I've listened to Tajik only on RFERL's Tajik service which only reflects the literary/'official' form of the language, and I hear [ɔ] loud and clear, and because my knowledge of Persian is very very limited the only way I can distinguish both dialects when spoken is precisely the pronunciation of 'ā' which in Tajik is /ɔ/ and /ɒ/ in Persian. Michael Hillmann in his 'Tajiki Textbook and Reader' says about 'o' similar to the sound of "au" in "caught"., which if I may add is pronounced /kɔːt/.

The vowel o and ӯ according to Perry and Baizoyev/Hayward

I quote from Perry (2005). "o is lower (more open) than Russian o, somewhat as in English "awful". Baizoyev and Hayward have o = o in "hot" or in "taught". From what I read o in Tajik is [ɒ]. For ӯ Perry (2005) has this: lies phonetically between u and y halfway to the Umlaut, a little lower than Lowland Scottish English "good", but higher than French "peu". B and H have it like "girl" or "first". LOL, not sure what to make of this vowel... Maybe [ʉ] or a bit lower? azalea_pomp

For "o", I think awful is a good example (almost [ɒː]). Also for ӯ, I think Perry's description is better than B/H. Can you give an example for [ʉ]? Jahangard 05:57, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

Is that American "awful" or English "awful" ? The sounds can be quite different. - Francis Tyers · 08:42, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

I just see English awful. I think for standard American and British English it is [ɔ], although he says somewhat? BH has both [ɒ] and [ɔ] due to hot and taught! The Writing Systems of the world does have [ɒ]. I think that Perry lists the vowel as always long although it is not phonemic. He does says it becomes a nasal before /n/. azalea_pomp

Isn't it (awful) [ɒː] in American English (the same sound as "au" in "Austria", and "Australia")? About /n/, when there isn't any vowel after it, the vowel before it is pronounced as a short vowel (it's a famous rule in finding the rhythm of classic Persian poems). That's why you don't see "ӯн " in Tajik texts. So, for example "Тоҷикистон" is pronounced as [tɒːdʒikistɒn] ([ɒ] instead of [ɒː] in this case). Jahangard 21:16, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

• Regarding ӯ. From S.D. Arzumanov's 'Худомӯзи забони тоҷикӣ' "Звук ӯ является звуком, средним между у и о. Наиболее простой способ атрикуляции этого звука таков: приготовившись к произнесению звука о, вы произносите звук у." Basically he's saying that ӯ is between o and u and in order to pronouce it you prepare yourself to say o but pronounce u, which if I'm not wrong means [ʊ]. By the way, maybe someone can contribute a better translation. Fnugh (talk)

Lazard (1956)

Vocalisme — Pour le vocalisme, persan et tadjik presentent des divergences massives. Le vocalisme du persian ancient, continuant celui du moyen-perse, comportait huit phonemes, trois voyelles breves, a, i, u et cinq longues, ā, ī, ē, ū, ō. Le tadjik comme le persan a modifie serieusement ce systeme, de deux facons. D'une part le nombre des phonemes est un peu reduit. D'autre part, les oppositions de quantite sont supprimer ou du moins tres transformees: aux oppositions de breves et longues se sont substituees en tadjik comme en persan des oppositions de voyelles "stables" et de voyelles "instables". La ligne generale d'evolution est donc la meme de part et d'autre, mais dans ce cadre, des differences considerables se sont developpees.

En tadjik, a est bien conserve comme un a anterieur, voyelle d'aperture maxima dont le timbre est en debit normal toujours celui d'un a franc. L'ancient ā s'est ferme en un o ouvert. ē est conserve. ō est continue par ů (en tadjik litteraire, orthographie ū), voyelle un peu moins fermee que u et articulee un peu plus en avant. Les ancient ĭ et ī d'une part , ŭ et ū d'autre part sont confondus respectivement en i et u. Les huit phonemes originaux sont donc reduits a six: i, e, a, o, ů et u. Ces six voyelles se divisent en dux groupes: o, e, ů s'opposent comme voyelles stables a a, i, u, voyelles instables. Ces designations expriment le fair, etabli par les recherches de phonetique experimentale, que les voyelles du premier groupe restent en toute position (accentuees ou non, en syllabe ouverte ou fermee), de duree approximativement constant (elles ne subissent d'abregement notable qu'en syllabe fermee inaccentuee: encore cette reduction est-elle toujours nettement inferieure a la moitie de leur duree et sont meme susceptibles, en debit rapide et dans un entourage consonantique favorable, de se reduire a un simple point vocalique; dans toutes les autres positions, leur duree est sensiblement egale a celle des voyelles du premier groupe. En d'autres termes, l'opposition de quantite subsiste, en tadjik, dans une seule position: en syllabe ouverte inaccentuee. On voit que les voyelles stables continuent exclusivement d'ancieenes longues, mais que d'autre part, les anciennes longues ī et ū, qui se sont confondues avec les breves correspondantes, sont representees par des voyelles instables. Autrement dit, en syllabe ouverte inaccentuee, les voyelles, i et u sont reduites de la meme maniere, qu'elles continuent d'ancient ī et ū, ou d'anciens ĭ et ŭ: didor "vue", dirůz "hier", sina "poitrine" (<dīdār, dīrōz, sīna) sont traites exactement comme jigar "foie", girift "a pris", šinos "reconnais" (<jigar, girift, šinās); budan "etre", surat "figure", guna "maniere" (<būdan, sūrat, gūna) sont traites commes gudoz "fusion", surud "chant", gunoh "peche" (<gudāz, surūd, gunāh). On peut schematiser l'evolution de la maniere suivante (les voyelles stables sont en gras):

i  ī    ē    a    ā    ō    ū  u
|__|    |    |    |    |    |__|
  |     |    |    |    |      |
  i     e    a    o    ů      u

From Lazard, G. (1956) "Charactères distinctifs de la language Tadjik". Bulletin de la Societe Linguistique de Paris. 52. pp. 117--186

This is the first page or so of the 7 page section on vowels. If anyone wants the rest I'll type it up tonight. - Francis Tyers · 10:01, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

It seems that Windfuhr has used Lazard's article for the Tajik part of his Persian phonology. Jahangard 21:20, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

Lazard's paper is written in a time that for listening to a wide range of Tajik accents, you needed to be in Tajikistan. Fortunately, in the age of Internet, there are several other alternatives to learn about Tajik phonology. For example you can listen to the Tajik reporters of Radio Ozodi (www.ozodi.org) to hear the typical standard Tajik accent (common in Dushanbe and in the mass media). For the Sughdi accent (which is the most influenced by Uzbek, and the most distant from the Dari accent), you can listen to the songs by Jurabek Murodov (a famous Tajik singer):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=589QfNjZvoE (It starts with "Ёри хушгилам, Зулайхо! Азизи дилам, Зулайхо!")

For the southern accents (which are closer to the Dari accent), Avesto Group is a good example:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jULdA7DyEVc (It starts with "Бевафоӣ макун ай нигорам"). Jahangard 22:01, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

Also for "ӯ" you can listen to this song by Afzalsho Shodiev (who has a Sughdi accent):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hiszNAQ4Jd8 (It starts with "Чи хабар зи ҷангу даъво? Ту мапурсу ман нагӯям.") Jahangard 22:31, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

Nice quotes and links everyone. Too bad I don't have a spectograph to put the Tajik audio samples in. Perry and Lazard are almost talking about the same pronuciation of the ů vowel , just from a different starting point. It seems to be a rounded near-close central vowel. azalea_pomp

Another source:

"the local name for the language is written забони тоҷикӣ, [zaˈbɔːnɪ tɔdʒɪ'ki]—and that the sound in Persian often transcribed <aa> in the Roman alphabet has become [ɔː], the vowel of English ‘bawl.’ The everyday greeting салом [salɔːm] is thus the Tajik rendering of the Persian and Arabic [salɑːm], ‘peace.’" [1]

- Francis Tyers · 14:22, 12 April 2007 (UTC)

Who is the author and what is its source? Jahangard 17:09, 12 April 2007 (UTC)

According to his CV, his knowledge of Tajiki is rudimentary at best.

I assume that his source is this book. The rest of the site seems to be an exercise in transliterating the examples in that book from Latin to Cyrillic. - Francis Tyers · 07:40, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

Finally the truth about ў

Here is a loosely transcribed radio play. Listen to the passages between 04:58 and 05:45, we can clearly hear the difference in pronunciation between the male and the female actors. The male's is [ʊ], which corresponds to what I wrote above: From S.D. Arzumanov's 'Худомӯзи забони тоҷикӣ' "Звук ӯ является звуком, средним между у и о. Наиболее простой способ атрикуляции этого звука таков: приготовившись к произнесению звука о, вы произносите звук у." Basically he's saying that ӯ is between o and u and in order to pronouce it you prepare yourself to say o but pronounce u, which if I'm not wrong means [ʊ].

1. 04:58 [...] дарбонҳо гўед, ки дигар ўро[...]
2. 05:09 Чаро ўро дастгирӣ намекунед?
3. 05:29 Кўдакам майда – гўён ҳар саҳар ба кор дер меои.
4. 05:42 Кўдакам таб дошт.
5. 05:45 Кўдакам таб дошт.

1, 3, 5 = male voice, [ʊ]

2, 4 = female voice, I'm not really sure how to describe it, it's definitely somewhat fronted, probably closest to [ø] Fnugh (talk) 16:59, 20 January 2011 (UTC)

Tajik ethnicity vs. Tajik language

This article seems confused on this subject. As I understand it, the ethnic Persians of Afghanistan are generally called "Tajiks." But the form of Persian they speak is closer to the Persian of Iran than it it is to the form spoken in the former Soviet Union. If so, we should be clear about this - Tajik is spoken in Tajikistan and Uzbek, Dari Persian is spoken by Tajiks in Afghanistan (and Pakistan, too?). The whole issue is confusing, but certainly this is true of the written languages - Tajik is written with Cyrillic, and Dari is written in Persian characters. We really shouldn't confuse this stuff. john k 19:08, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

Tajiks are not ethnically Persians, they are Tajiks, who themselves are ethnically East-Iranic despite having adopted a West-Iranic language (kind of like how Iranian Azeris are still Turkic despite having adopted an Iranic language). Dari is a lot closer to Tojiki than it is to Farsi, both in grammar and pronunciation.Lightsdownlow (talk) 14:43, 18 October 2008 (UTC)

Tajik Scouting

Can someone render Tayar Osay (Be Prepared), the Scout Motto, into Tajik? Thanks! Chris 06:46, 8 August 2007 (UTC)

Are you sure that is the motto? It could be "Таяр Осай", but that gets no Google results, so don't take my word on it. Can you tell me where you found that? (The rendering in latin script). - Francis Tyers · 14:12, 11 August 2007 (UTC)

The above phrase "Tayar Osay" is not Tajiki or any Persian dialect, it is Pashto. The translation of "Be Prepared" in Tajiki would be "Tayyor boshed", written in Cyrillic as Тайёр бошед. Note that in Tajiki, the rules of capitalization are different, so to capitalize the second word would appear strange. Siyovush (talk) 19:07, 19 February 2008 (UTC)

Vocabulary table

It seems a bit silly to list all the comparisons between Tajik and various other Indo-European languages, but not include Persian! Many of the differences will be shared by Persian; what would be interesting is to see what divergences exist from Persian.

It might also be helpful to mention when the political situation changed such that the ancestors of the Tajik language and the Persian language became separated. Was this the Persian-Russian wars of the 18th-19th centuries? --Saforrest 23:10, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

Iran and Transoxania have been politically separate since the end of Timurids. But the cultural separation of Transoxania and the rest of Persian-speaking areas (like northern Afghanistan) is not that old (it goes back to the late 19th century, and became more influential after the Russian revolution). Alefbe (talk) 20:48, 20 April 2009 (UTC)

The table is now getting quite overblown and serves little value in illuminating the relations of Tajik to other languages. Outside of the Indo-Iranian subfamily, I don't see the need for so many exemplar languages per subfamily - one or two should be sufficient. We certainly don't need six Slavic languages and eight Romance languages there. Anyone disagree? I say the table should just be cut down to Latin and maybe one modern Romance language, English, Greek, one Slavic language, and one Baltic language, and then put in more Indo-Iranian languages instead. cab (talk) 12:08, 18 April 2009 (UTC)

I think all the non-Iranian columns should be removed. Alefbe (talk) 20:42, 20 April 2009 (UTC)

I've been bold and removed most of it. Left Latin, Greek, Lithuanian, and one Slavic language (Polish, mainly because it was at the top of the list --- wasn't really sure which one to pick, feel free to pick another or remove entirely). cab (talk) 00:40, 21 April 2009 (UTC)

Transliteration

Many of the Tajik examples are supplemented with transliterations into quasi-English ASCII rather than IPA; e.g.,

• мурғ (murgh) 'fowl' and хурус (khurus) 'rooster'. Alternatively the modifiers 'нар' (nar) for male or 'мода' (moda) for female can be pre or post-posed to the noun, e.g. хари нар (xari nar) 'male donkey' and хари мода (xari moda) 'female donkey'.

In this paragraph the boldface examples transliterate Cyrillic "х" with Roman "kh" (English ASCII), while the underlined ones use Roman "x" (IPA or approximation). Shouldn't they all be in IPA? Thnidu (talk) 14:32, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

Tajikistani Persian

Dialects of Arabic are sometimes almost totally unintelligible. Yet, they are always referred to as "X Arabic" and not "X language". European and Brazilian Portuguese have many differences but as we see, they are both considered as variants of the same language "Portuguese". Persian is also a pluricentric language like them and many others (Indian English, Canadian French, Austrian German, Mexican Spanish, ...). There must not be an exception for naming Persian variants. The Persian variant spoken in Tajikistan should be referred to as "Tajikistani Persian". "Tajikistani Persian" is better than "Tajiki Persian". "Tajik" is the name of an ethnic group, which apart from Tajikistan, also live in Afghanistan, Uzbekistan and China. We should name after country and not the ethnic group: Iranian Persian, Tajikistani Persian, Afghanistani Persian. In Iranian Persian, we also say "Fârsi ye Tâjikestân" (Tajikistani Persian, Persian of Tajikistan). Since its script is different, it is plausible to discuss about it in a separate page but please regard the fact that it is a variant of Persian language and not a different language. --Alijsh (talk) 06:10, 20 April 2009 (UTC)

"Tajikistani Persian" is neither widely used nor correct (this variety of Persian is not only related to Tajikisatn, but also to the Tajiks of Uzbekistan). Most of the reliable academic sources (including Perry's book) refer to it as "Tajik Persian". For disambiguation and to differentiate it from the Persian dialects of Tajiks of Afghanistan, some scholars (like Muhammadjon Shakuri) use "Transoxanian Tajik Persian" or "Transoxanian Persian", but these terms have not become common yet. So, the best title is "Tajik Persian". Alefbe (talk) 20:34, 20 April 2009 (UTC)

As well, someone or something of Tajikistan is usually referred to in English as Tajik, not *Tajikistani. In English it much more common to use Afghan, Kyrgyz, Uzbek, Kazkh, Turkmen, and typically not: *Afghanistani, *Kyrgyzstani, *Kazakhstani, or *Turkmenistani. It much like the term Albanian. It can refer to both a citizen of the country of Albania or an ethnic Albanian. I noticed someone has quoted the CIA Factbook since I guess it uses -stani, but the CIA Factbook is not an authority on the English language. None of the -stani words are in the American Heritage Dictionary. Pakistani is the only common -stani form I can think of at the moment. While you hear about the "Afghan government", one would never say "Afghanistani government". Azalea pomp (talk) 23:37, 20 April 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for the replies. English is not my native language. WordNet had them and I thought they are part of the common vocabulary. I wasn't aware of the exact meaning and usage of "Tajik". If it has such a usage "it can refer to both a citizen of the country or an ethnic of the country", then why looking for another word? So, "Tajik Persian" and "Afghan Persian". Thanks. What I wanted was to name Persian variants as per "X Persian" (like other pluricentric languages), which is now fulfilled. - Regards--Alijsh (talk) 03:56, 21 April 2009 (UTC)

@Alefbe: Can you please do the same for Dari (Eastern Persian)? This variant should be called "Afghan Persian". "Dari" means "official". In other words, "Standard". The "Standard Persian" of Iran is also called "Fârsi-ye Dari" (Dari Persian). And historically, "Dari Persian" was/is the standard form of the language used for writing poetry, etc. Persian poets of different regions wrote their works in this form. Confining "Dari Persian" to the variant spoken in Afghanistan is not right. Also, considering the current Persian variant of Afghanistan as "Dari Persian". If it needs further explanation, please tell me to write about it in the talk page of "Dari (Eastern Persian)"--Alijsh (talk) 04:12, 21 April 2009 (UTC)

In English, we refer to official dialect of Persian of Afghanistan as Dari. We refer to the official dialect of Persian of Iran as Persian. Honestly this entry should be called Tajik language and not Tajik Persian if we are using English norms. The everyday language of course does not reflect the complexity or how Persian, Dari, Tajik, along with Hazaragi, Aimaq, and other Persian dialects relate to each other in a precise way. Azalea pomp (talk) 07:09, 21 April 2009 (UTC)

I relied on Perry's book (which is the most important source on this subject, in English language). Alefbe (talk) 15:09, 21 April 2009 (UTC)

@Azalea pomp:This is Persian and us Persian speakers that define norms. Persian variants are quite intelligible. I am a native speaker of Persian and have spoken with Persian speakers of the other countries and have watched their programs. And I mentioned examples from Arabic and Portuguese variants that have many differences. Us Persian speakers consider our dialects as variants of one language. For example, look at these two articles in Persian Wikipedia 1 2: we are saying "Persian of Iran", "Persian of Afghanistan" and "Persian of Tajikistan". Quite like Portuguese saying "Português de Portugal", "Português do Brasil" and Spanish saying "Español de España", "Español de México", "Español de Argentina", ... I don't know why the Persian speakers' viewpoint is being disregarded. Persian is a relatively less known language to Westerners and the variant names are not still established. In the past, we just dealt with Iran (Afghanistan and Tajikistan are old regions but relatively new countries). That's why you are saying "We refer to the official dialect of Persian of Iran as Persian". Such names are not good now that we have countries "Iran", "Afghanistan" and "Tajikistan". Although using "Persian" alone brings "Persian of Iran" to one's mind like "Spanish" bringing "Spanish of Spain" to mind (for many) but "The official dialect of Persian of Iran" should be fully called "Iranian Persian" and not "Persian". Even following English norms for naming variants ("X Arabic", "X French", "X Spanish", ...), we should say "Iranian/Afghan/Tajik Persian". Anyway, I won't further discuss about it.-Regards--Alijsh (talk) 17:25, 21 April 2009 (UTC)

No, we don't define norms in English language. Reliable sources (written in English language) define the norms (on the usage of terms in English language). Alefbe (talk) 17:29, 21 April 2009 (UTC)

Another example of an English norm is the use Castilian Spanish. For English speakers Castilian Spanish or just Castilian mean the "standard" Spanish spoken in Spain. It does not refer to the Spanish spoken in Latin America. No English speaker would say they speak Castilian in Argentina for example. While in much of Latin America, the speakers refer to their Spanish and Spanish in general as Castellano (Castilian). For linguistics, Castilian also just means specifically the Spanish dialects of Castile. English has its own norms and so it does not follow those of others necessarily. Azalea pomp (talk) 18:56, 21 April 2009 (UTC)

Tajik Persian is the appropriate title , as most linguists define Tajik as a dialect of Persian, and not a separate language. The original title of this page was, correctly, Tajik Persian as well, before it was unilaterally moved [2] by a new user without any prior discussions or a consensus. --Kurdo777 (talk) 10:53, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

I find it necessary to make a factual correction to the statement by Kurdo777: the article was called Tajik language (Tajik prior to that) since its creation in October 2003 and until 21 April 2009. On 21 April 2009 (less than a month ago) the title was unilaterally changed by Alefbe to Tajik Persian after a discussion on talk page that, in my opinion, did not reach a consensus (see above). It therefore seems to me that the established consensus title is Tajik language and the change to Tajik Persian requires a much broader consensus and a much more extensive list of references to English usage than we have been offered. --Zlerman (talk) 11:20, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

I made a mistake in my observation. I do, however, endorse Alfbe's move, as this user had taken part in the discussions here and had provided sufficient reasoning prior to the move. Zhangdeming, on the other hand, had not even bothered making a comment on the talk page before he re-moved the page. --Kurdo777 (talk) 11:38, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

I agree with Kurdo777 that novice user Zhangdeming acted completely out of turn. I think, however, that more evidence is needed to support the move from Tajik language to Tajik Persian. The discussion above seems to rely entirely on Perry (2005), whereas other sources use Tajik (or Tajiki), not Tajik Persian, and Perry himself freely switches from Tajik Persian to Tajik (and back) throughout his book. Let's try to collect more facts and more evidence on common English usage. --Zlerman (talk) 12:03, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

Tajik Persian, can be and is usually shortened to Tajik. Dari is also the shortened form of Dari Persian. I think you have not heard about the communities of Persian-speaking countries (e.g. 1, 2, 3) where even the official bodies from the three country (Iran, Afghanistan, Tajikistan) participate in. It would make no sense to participate in such communities if the bodies from Tajikistan, for example, believed that their language is not (a variant of) "Persian". My contribution to collecting more evidences :) --Alijsh (talk) 11:52, 19 May 2009 (UTC)

We have to consider too the line between a language and dialect is often a vague one and rarely consistent. Yes, mutual intelligibility is often the one used by linguists, but we should also take into consideration the history, official, or person views of any linguistic form. Are Czech and Slovak, mutually intelligible? We have read that they are, but we surely don't call either Czech or Slovak dialects of one another. I think we all know that Tajik and the Persian of Iran are mostly mutually intelligible and that they are dialects of Persian (the broader sense). Yet, I think since the official language of Tajikistan is labeled as the Tajik language and not the Tajik dialect of Persian, correct? If this is a page about the official form of Tajik of Tajikistan, then I think Tajik language makes more sense. Of course, as we know the so-called Tajik language of China is Sarikoli... Perhaps this page should be Tajik language (Tajikistan) while the one in China is Sarikoli language with a redirect of Tajik language (China), and have Tajik language as a disambiguation page. Azalea pomp (talk) 08:59, 20 May 2009 (UTC)

In the soviet era, the term "Tajik language" was more common in academic publications (under the influence of soviet linguists). But now, both terms ("Tajik Persian" and "Tajik language") are common. Among the English academic texts, Perry's book is the most up-to-date and reliable source and it uses Tajik Persian for the title. If we were writing during the soviet time, it would had made sense to use the soviet terminology and rely mainly on Rastorgueva's book (which is written in 1960's), but now, the time has changed. Alefbe (talk) 21:05, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

Wikipedia standard is to have "language" after languages. Thus "Tajik language" is more appropriate. The Tajik Constitution states:

Моддаи 2. Забони давлатии Тоҷикистон забони тоҷикӣ аст.

The language of the state of Tajikistan is the Tajik language.[3]

- Francis Tyers · 14:03, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

The usage in local Tajik media is irrelevant (because they also use this term to refer to the Persian language as a whole). Indeed, in many Tajik websites, when they talk about "adabiyoti tojiki" (Tajik literature), they mean "Persian literature", not just the modern Tajik literature in Transoxiana. The same situation is in Afghanistan. In their constitution, they talk about "Dari language" and by that they mean "Persian language" . None of those who use the term "забони тоҷикӣ" consider it a language different from the language of Ferdowsi and Hafez. Alefbe (talk) 15:25, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

This opinion piece by Dodkhudo Simuddinov (head of the Rudaki language research center, Academy of science of Tajikistan) is quite informative about the main argument. He argues in favor of using the term "забони тоҷикӣ", because he says the Persian language (New Persian) originated in Transoxiana and it's fine to call it "zaboni tojiki" (so, the discussion is not about considering it a separate language). In Tajikistan itself, to refer to this special variant of Persian language, some prominent researchers (such as Muhammadjon Shakuri) use the term "forsii tojikii farorud" (Tajik Persian of Transoxiana). Shakuri has recently published a book (in Tajik alphabet) with the title "sarnavishti forsii tojikii farorud dar qarni 20". Alefbe (talk) 15:48, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

This is not local Tajik media, but the constitution of the Republic. - Francis Tyers · 22:40, 14 August 2009 (UTC)

As I have already explained, you are taking their word out of context. The constitution talks about "zaboni tajiki", not to distinguish this special variant from Persian language, but to refer to Persian language (the same way that they talk about "khatti niyogon", and they mean Perso-Arabic script). The situation is quite the same as the constitution of Afghanistan (in which Persian language is referred to as "zabān-e dari"). Alefbe (talk) 23:08, 14 August 2009 (UTC)

If I may interject, I urge you to look again at the above post from "Azalea pomp" ("Another example of an English norm"...). This is the English Wikipedia and therefore the correct nomenclature here is the one that is established as the standard in linguistics works published in English. As Azalea pomp showed, this might be quite different than the standard as established in non-English language works. Therefore, discussion regarding what Tajiks or Iranians or whoever else think is the correct term for the Persian-derived language spoken by Tajiks is not relevant to this particular debate. The relevant question is, what is the consensus among linguists writing in English? -- Hux (talk) 04:30, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

My comment to Francis was related to the issue of the official Tajik terminology that he mentioned. About the usage in English texts, I had already mentioned earlier that both terms "Tajik Persian" and "Tajik language" are common. Among these two common terms, I think it's better to choose the title which was used by the most recent and the most important English book on this subject (i.e. Perry's book). Alefbe (talk) 04:52, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

Tajik Persian is the more appropriate title, as Tajik is a dialect/variety of Persian written in the Cyrillic alphabet, it's not really a separate language. --Kurdo777 (talk) 05:09, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

I'm new to the topic, but are you all sure you're not confusing disambiguation titles with actual usage? Just because an article has a title that is designed to disambiguate it from other articles that potentially could have the same name, like Tajik people, doesn't mean it has to use that title in the lead. Variety (linguistics) is still, after all, just "variety" and nothing else. As far as I can tell, hardly anyone would actually use the term "Tajik Persian" to describe this language. The actual terms seem to be either "Tajik" or "Tajiki" (and this is also what has been opted for in the article itself).

Peter ^Isotalo 06:50, 12 September 2009 (UTC)

For the usage of "Tajik Persian" you use a simple search (on Internet, books and academic articles). The situation is not exactly the same as a word like "German" or "English" (it's more like "Quebec French"). "Tajik language" here means "language of Tajiks" and it's a little meaningless to use "Tajik" alone to refer to this language (you can also compare the term to "Berber languages" in this regard). Alefbe (talk) 10:00, 12 September 2009 (UTC)

"German" is also "language of the Germans". The "language" bit is just a clarification that is for the most part required to distinguish ethnic groups from the languages they speak. The most commonly term for the language is for the most part simply "German". Comparing this with "Berber languages" is not quite relevant since that is a rather disparate group of languages. It's better to compare the Berber languages to, say, Romance languages, which would never really be referred to as just "Romance" (except maybe in the adjective form).

My attempt to google for "Tajik Persian"[4] is actually the reason why I raised this issue. Something like half of the 12,800 hits (a very low figure when you think about it) seem to refer to "Tajik Persian" as an adjective, as in "Tajik-Persian music". Searching for "Tajik"[5] or "Tajik language"[6], on the other hand, renders millions of hits, though the former would also include a lot of examples of the adjective form. If you look up "Tajik" at Dictionary.com[7] you get this definition and the alternative "Tajiki", but no "Tajik Persian". Britannica.com[8] sorts the information under "Tadzhik language". The online version of the OED sorts all of the relevant definitions under the combined noun-and-adjective-article "Tajik".

So while "Tajik Persian" seems like a farily good compromise article title, it seems to be in very limited use as a term for this particular linguistic entity. The most common term obviously appears to be "Tajik", and this seems to be readily acknowledged in this article, as the only instance where "Tajik Persian" is actually used in prose is in the first sentence of the lead. And unlike some have stated in this discussion, what term linguists use for Tajik is not the single deciding factor. WP:LANG has to the best of my knowledge never agreed on any special exceptions to Wikipedia:Naming conventions (common names); the only specific rules that I know of are Wikipedia:Naming conventions (languages). Use among academics simply doesn't trump general usage anymore than it does in other areas.

Peter ^Isotalo 20:02, 12 September 2009 (UTC)

Searching the word "Tajik" is quite useless in this case (because most of the results are about other things related to Tajikistan or Tajik people, not about this language variety). If you search over English books, results for "Tajik Persian" and "Tajik language" are in the same range, so both of them are almost equally common. To choose between these two common terms, it's better to rely on the most related and recent English books on this subject (where Perry's book is the most important example). Alefbe (talk) 20:34, 12 September 2009 (UTC)

P.S: You should note that dictionary.com is not a reliable source. Anyway, as I explained before, both terms are commonly used (bot in specialized academic sources and general publications). Alefbe (talk) 20:48, 12 September 2009 (UTC)

As I pointed out myself, searching for "Tajik" does include plenty of usages of the adjective form of the word (but it also results in tons of references to the language). "Tajik +language" actually renders even more, not fewer, hits than searching for just "Tajik". Google is naturally a rather blunt tool when trying to determine how common certain terms are, but in this case "Tajik Persian" doesn't show signs of dominating the field enough to merit a first place mention. Even among the compartively few hits that do show up, there's a lot of "Tajik-Persian" and similar hits, a lof ot which seem to be related specifically to music. Doing a Google Books search doesn't prove much either; "Tajik language" [9] gets you slightly more hits than "Tajik Persian"[10]. The dictionaries, though, don't appear to be ambiguous, but favor simply "Tajik". Questioning dictionary.com, which merely takes its info from established dictionaries, as a reliable source doesn't change that, especially when OED agrees. While I'm sure Perry is a reliable and useful source for Tajik grammar, it doesn't decide what the most commonly used terms are.

Peter ^Isotalo 22:12, 12 September 2009 (UTC)

Most of the results for "Tajik Persian" are exactly related to this language variety. There might be a few cases that search results are related to something else, but that's also the case for the term "Tajik language" (some of the search results are related to the language of Tajiks of Xinjiang). Alefbe (talk) 00:04, 13 September 2009 (UTC)

We seem to be pretty much agreeing that googling for either term gives roughly equal results. Searches for either term give roughly the same amount of hits and both contain plenty of references to something other than this article topic. However, the dictionaries appear to be pretty clear about "Tajik" being the common term with "Tajiki" in second place.

"Tajik" appears to be the choice of pretty much all editors here on Wikipedia (see linkage to article here (which doesn't prove anything in of itself, but is certainly an interesting coincidence). And what is seriously confusing is the insistance of having the current title of the article display first in lead, even though it's not even used in the article itself.

Peter ^Isotalo 08:40, 13 September 2009 (UTC)

The title should be be displayed first in the lead (there's nothing confusing about it). Alefbe (talk) 12:19, 13 September 2009 (UTC)

The title is only supposed to be displayed first if it's also the most common name. WP:LEAD is pretty clear about avoiding self-descriptive leads. In this case, the title of the article is designed to disambiguate it from Tajik people and was only recently changed from Tajik language. It still does not appear to be the most common term, and should not be treated as such. Also, introducing an article with one term and then proceed to use the second alternative is, if not confusing, then at least rather inconsistent.

Peter ^Isotalo 13:03, 13 September 2009 (UTC)

As I've already explained, "Tajik Persian" is one of the most common terms (it's not particularly less common than "Tajik language"). Alefbe (talk) 13:05, 13 September 2009 (UTC)

Rahim Masov

reference on Rahim Masov's work is highly inappropriate, because his entire works consist of irredentist ideas, that is why it is non-neutral and biased. I propose for removal, and presenting more academic sources. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Torebay (talk • contribs) 07:33, 17 December 2009 (UTC)

"Archaic" is linguistically problematic

A living language cannot be "archaic." To dub the Tajik language "an archaic form of Persian" is linguistic chauvinism. It's akin to saying people in the Amazon or in Borneo speak "primitive languages" because they lack words for computer, automobile or chocolate sundae. It's an irrational and unempirical worldview and is linguistically unsound.

If a language is currently spoken, it is not archaic. It, by definition, cannot be archaic; it's contemporary. The parity of languages disallows such temporal categorizations of language as primitive or archaic if they are in current use by a people.

Using that phrase does one of two things:

1. Relegates the language to a lower status than Modern Farsi 2. Denotes that the language is less than developed, which, as a spoken, living language, is impossible and not at all empirical.

EDIT: I would suggest the following: "The phonology of Tajik is more similar to Proto-Indo-Iranian/has maintained an inventory of phonemes, lexemes, etc." (this is for example only. I am not very familiar with these languages, so perhaps Proto-Indo-Iranian is not the correct point of divergence for Farsi and Tajik, though it sounds like it probably would be).

74.233.115.23 (talk) 20:22, 15 August 2010 (UTC)Jim

On E and I in Tajik dialect of Persian

Dear friends,

There are two e and two i sounds in Tajik Persian. E is usually reflected in Э and Е in tajik cyrillic alphabet, the first always comes in the beginning. Long e can be encountered in words such as sheer, eeraan, deevaar etc. Short E can be seen in words like ehsaan, ehtiraam, mehmaan, mehtar, farbeh etc. Similarly, we have two i sounds, one is long in words such as iimaan, diiruz, diidan, shuniidan etc, another is short i, examples of which are nigaah, siyaah, sipar, imruz, insaan.

But some words, you can encounter both long or short i, like digar-diigar, jigar-jiigar, etc.

We have also two u sounds, one is short u and another is long: long u - fiiruuz,ruuz, duuzanda, kuur, shuur, duruud, suruud. short u - shud, umar, shumurdan, burdan, buz, etc. Also there are words that have both long and short forms, like bud-buud, khun-khuun, chun-chuun, dud-duud, theese are especially used in poetry to make rhymes work.

But also there words, that by changing short into long u, the meaning also changes, like gul-guul, buz-buuz, pur-puur etc.

O and A in Tajik Persian are the same almost, but O is a long aa, like ahmad, but aaftaab (oftob). Tajik o in Cyrillic alphabet can never be compared with o in other languages, inclduing Russian, as o in these languages is a sound close to u, rather than long aa.

In some tajik dialects, especially in the north of Tajikistan dn and in cities of Samarkand and Bukhara long uu is pronounced like u in English words like bird, shirt, dirt. Therefore, in cyrillic alphabet it is reflected in Ӯ, contrary to У. In fact both Ӯ and У can be seen in long and short forms.

Best wshes,

Esfandiar  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 91.218.160.4 (talk) 18:53, 3 July 2011 (UTC) 

The words "tat" and "tatchik" could not be Turkic ("tat" in Turkic means "taste") but are Indo-European Iranic from Iranic Tude(=people) out of PIE *teuta(=people) wich gave the names "deutsch" and "dutch"

Hello

The words "tat" and "tatchik" could not be Turkic ("tat" in Turkic means "taste") but are Indo-European Iranic from Iranic Tude(=people) out of PIE *teuta(=people) wich gave the names "deutsch" and "dutch"

Thanks

Humanbyrace (talk) 17:05, 21 June 2012 (UTC)