Persian Language - Varieties

Regional and social varieties:

• Modern Persian
  • Western variant (Persian)
  • Eastern variant (Dari-Persian)
  • Central Asian variant (Tajiki-Persian)
  • Hazara dialects (Hazaragi)
  • Judeo-Persian (Dzhidi)
  • Judeo-Tajik (Bukhori)
• Middle Persian
• Old Persian

Grammar:

• Standard New Persian
• Central Asian Persian

Language features:

• Vocabulary
  • Nouns
  • Verbs
• Phonology

Writing systems:

• Perso-Arabic script
• Cyrillic alphabet
• Romanized Persian alphabet

Geographic distribution:

• Persian by country

There are three modern varieties of standard Persian:

• Western Persian (Persian, Iranian Persian, or Farsi) is spoken in Iran, and by minorities in Iraq and the Persian Gulf states.
• Eastern Persian (Dari Persian, Afghan Persian, or Dari) is spoken in Afghanistan.
• Tajiki (Tajik Persian) is spoken in Tajikistan and Uzbekistan. It is written in the Cyrillic script.

All these three varieties are based on the classic Persian literature and its literary tradition. There are also several local dialects from Iran, Afghanistan and Tajikistan which slightly differ from the standard Persian. Hazaragi (in Central Afghanistan and Pakistan), Herati (in Western Afghanistan), Darwazi (in Afghanistan and Tajikistan), Tehrani (in Iran) and Dehwari (in Pakistan) are examples of these dialects. Persian-speaking peoples of Iran, Afghanistan, and Tajikistan can understand one another with a relatively high degree of mutual intelligibility, give or take minor differences in vocabulary, pronunciation, and grammar – much in the same relationship as shared between British and American English.

ISO 639-3 lists ten dialects of Persian, the three main literary dialects listed above and seven regional dialects: Hazaragi, Aimaq, Bukharic, Dzhidi, Dehwari, Darwazi, Pahlavani.

The following are some languages closely related to Persian:

• Luri (or Lori), spoken mainly in the southwestern Iranian provinces of Lorestan, Kohgiluyeh and Boyer-Ahmad Province, some western parts of Fars Province and some parts of Khuzestan.
• Tat, spoken in parts of Azerbaijan, Russia, etc. It includes Judæo-Tat & Christian-Tat.
• Lari (in southern Iran)

Read more about this topic:  Persian Language