Talk:Zoroastrian Dari language

Behdinan is a Kurdish language. So Zoroastrian is originates from the Kurdish language. We call it zerdeshti and our holy book is awesta. Many Kurds go by that name as well. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2A00:801:4AD:7F53:546C:CF07:1DE9:CC6A (talk) 20:57, 27 October 2022 (UTC)

Untitled

Dari is also commonly known by the appellation Gabri, but this name might be taken by some Zoroastrians as highly offensive, as it literally means 'language of the infidels'.

Is it taken by some Zoroastrians as highly offensive? Are we just guessing on this? john k 03:32, 2 August 2005 (UTC)

No, trust me, you aren't guessing! Nowhere have I ever read that they any Zartushtis like this name. That would be like saying blacks enjoyed being called "niggers". Don't ask me what's wrong with this page (and why all intelligent people don't use unicode nowadays!), but there's a short etymology of gabr, gaur, gōr, etc. here. Also of interest is a page about the Zoroastrian quarter, called the Gabr-Mahalla from Vohuman.org. I also wish someone could find a picture of a Zoroastrian quarter in Yazd or Kerman. I've used the Yazd Fire Temple picture for my, well, Fire Temple article. Though I suppose there's no rule against redundancy (is there?).

Also regarding Darī درى, Mary Boyce (the preëminent Zoroastrian scholar), says: "One especial barrier which the Zoroastrians had raised in self-protection, and upon which Western observers commented, was linguistic. In their rural fastness they had adopted a local dialect, incomprehensible to speakers of standard Persian, which they called 'Dari', the Muslims 'Gabri'; and this was spoken (though almost never written) by all Zoroastrians among themselves." (Zoroastrians, p. 178). Similar to Dari is the Indian equivalent of Parsi Gujarati which itself has been compared to Yiddish. Khirad talk

About the etymology of gabr, there is no academic consensus. Zoroastrians in Iran don't call themselves gabr, but many of them use the words Gabri and Gabrōni to refer to the language. Jahangard 23:20, 27 February 2007 (UTC)

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Ive removed a paragraph from the Dari's dialects secton, as it was incorrect. Naini and the dialect of Abiyaneh are distinct languages, though they are all closely related. --Maziart 08:11, 26 April 2006 (UTC)

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Excuse-me because I really don't know anything about Dari but... just because of this, it seems to me that Dari entry and Dari (Zoroastrian) look like they're talking about the same thing. If same, I guess they should be merged. If different... well, the difference should be made more evident for those (as myself) who don't see the difference Ictlogist 13:56, 26 April 2006 (UTC)

About the etymology and meaning of Gabr

There is no academic consensus over the etymology of gabr. So, saying that "gabr means infidel" is wrong (that pseudo-etymology about the relation of "kāfer" and "gabr" is rejected by academic sources). Zoroastrians don't call themselves gabr, mostly because of its usage in muslim texts (not because of its etymology). I should also note that the situation is different for "gabri" and "gabrōni". Many Iranian zoroastrians use these words to refer to the language. Jahangard 19:03, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

Zoroastrians when speaking Fari to outsiders prefer to refer to their language as "dari". Non-Zoroastrians are reported in the literature to call it "gabri" though I have never heard anybody do so, though perhaps in the past when Yazd was a much smaller city and more of the population was in contact with the Zoroastrians this was more common. "gavrŭni" is the nativization into Dari of "gabri", which the Zoroastrians use amongst themselves, though I have been told on numerous occasions that they would like outsiders to know the language as "dari". I have never heard "gabrōni" with a "b". I would like to change the entry to reflect this but I am unsure how to transcribe the second vowel. In the main city dialect of Dari, this sound is somewhere between IPA [u] and [o]. Any suggestions? --Maziart 05:20, 4 April 2007 (UTC)

I've often heard "gabrōni" (may be only Zoroastrians in larger cities use this pronounciation and the original Dari pronounciation is "gavrōni"). I agree that that vowel is somewhere between IPA [uː] and [oː] (it's a long wovel, similar to what is usualy transcripted as ō fo Middle Persian). Anyway, I was wondering if there is any old record for using the name "Dari" for this language. Do we have any pre-nineteenth century source which refer to that language as Dari? Jahangard 05:11, 5 April 2007 (UTC)

Dari doesnt have a vowel length distinction; is there any way of just representing the quality? I dont know of any prenineteenth century sources at all.--Maziart 05:18, 5 April 2007 (UTC)

About the word gabr, Iranica article is quite informative. Jahangard 02:03, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

Although its etymology is obscure, many use it to mean infidel regardless of its origins. The Ethnologue says Gabar and Gabri are derogatory names. It also lists Yazdi as a derogatory name, but that makes no sense as Yazdi is simply a geographic designation of the language which is very common for Iran's languages... azalea_pomp

In-Text Citations, Verifiability

I dispute the specific statement that Dari is a Northwest Iranian language and not merely a local dialect of the Persian language. I can find no evidence for that statement in any academic reference. A link to another Wikipedia article which itself is unverified is not a legitimate in-text citation. That list of references is meaningless if it does not explain which material is being cited by which references. A reader cannot be expected to read the whole list of references in order to verify one sentence in the article.

Please familiarize yourself with Wikipedia's policy on verification.

Wikipedia:Verifiability, which is policy, says that attribution is required for "direct quotes and for material that is challenged or likely to be challenged". Any material that is challenged and for which no source is provided may be removed by any editor.

The threshold for inclusion in Wikipedia is verifiability, not truth. "Verifiable" in this context means that any reader should be able to check that material added to Wikipedia has already been published by a reliable source. Editors should provide a reliable source for quotations and for any material that is challenged or is likely to be challenged, or it may be removed. [1]

--Dfitzgerald 16:17, 27 September 2007 (UTC)

well, I don't know very much about this language, but ...

• the first link I checked (the one in the language box on the right) yielded "Northwest Iranian." While the second sentence of the article suggested that there wouldn't be much information on the language, your assertion that there were "no" academic references seems a little strange as all the off-site links provided in the article were academic resources, and all of them identified it as Northwestern.
• while the article didn't explicitly state that Dari was not a local variant of NP, its northwestern-ness and that Dari has a distinct ISO 639-3 language code were clues that it was distinct. That SIL database entry for the ISO code clinched it. Two dictionaries listed in the Bibliography suggested distinctiveness as well. I then did the legwork anyway and checked a few of the resources listed in the bibliography proper. I discovered that the language not only has a distinct vocabulary, morphology and some very peculiar verb forms, but that it is also not intelligible to speakers of standard Persian. Thats quite remarkable for Central Iran.

I also discovered that the entire bibliography section was an pretentious cut-and-paste job of a list on the web. Junked in favor of a link to that bibliography list.

-- Fullstop 23:16, 27 September 2007 (UTC)

Dfitzgerald,

Please familiarize yourself with a less patronizing approach to other users. Assume their good faith.

It would have been more constructive if you had explained what specific statement you were challenging, instead that somewhat asserting that the whole article lacked proper in-text citation and/or references.

I think that Fullstop made a very good job. Thank you.

--FrancescoMazzucotelli 00:45, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

Concerns about accuracy [from Talk:Parsi-Dari ]

Ethnologue is just a collection of information from different sources. Sometimes it cites its sources, sometimes it doesn't. Credibility of those Ethnologue entries which does not cite any source is not more than the credibility of unreferenced Wikipedia pages. In this special case, claiming that there is an ethnolect, related to Zoroastrians, spoken by 700000 speakers, is just nonsense. the whole population of Zoroastrians is less than 100000. There is an ethnolect of Zoroastrians (near Yazd and Kerman) which is called Dari (also called Gabroni, Gabri), belonging to the northwestern Iranian dialects (central subgroup). It's more probable that Enthnologue has mistakenly mixed this information with something else and has come up with pure nonsense. If you insist on these claims, cite a reliable academic source (something such as "Compendium Linguarum Iranicarum", edited by Rüdiger Schmitt). Jahāngard 15:55, 30 November 2007 (UTC)

Yep, its definitely insane. It seems Ethnologue have muddled Dari (Zoroastrian) and Dari (Afghan) into one big pot, into which they then threw a completely fictitious "Parsi" prp to really confuse things. (The Parsis don't speak any Iranian language. The Indian Iranis might, but their personal dialect depends on where they came from).

What do you say to a redirect? -- Fullstop (talk) 05:54, 7 December 2007 (UTC)

Redirect would be a good idea, but it should be redirected to a disambiguation page. Jahāngard (talk) 17:20, 11 December 2007 (UTC)

No redirect until some consensus is achieved. There are plenty of sources about the Iranian ancestry of the language spoken by some Parsis in India. But that is not the problem here. The problem here is whether there is one or two languages spoken by Zoroastrian remnants in Iran. Unfortunately I do not have access to either Languages of Iran: Past and Present (2005) Weber, D, (ed.) ISBN 3447052996 or Compendium linguarum Iranicarum (1989) Rüdiger Schmitt (ed.) ISBN 3882264136, although I am working on getting the first one via interlibrary loan. Ethnologue did not muddy Eastern Farsi and Dari (Zoroastrian). They are quite clear about the difference, and many other sources make that distinction. Now-a-days Dari (Zoroastrian) seems to be more known from members of the communities who have fled Iran than from sources within Iran. Please don't make wild statements, cite sources in English. --Bejnar (talk) 22:33, 8 December 2007 (UTC)

Bejnar, don't be more sure than you need to be. :) This article is really not worth getting into a tiff about. If you find more on this hypothetical "Parsi-Dari," then all the better. All Jahangard and I are pointing out is that - in this case - the Ethnologue has very obviously screwed up big time, and to base an article solely on this one Ethnologue entry is no good.

>>"The problem here is whether there is one or two languages spoken by Zoroastrian remnants in Iran"

With less than 20,000 Zoroastrians in Iran (and less than 200,000 world wide), there cannot be 350,000 speakers of Parsi-Dari in Iran (and 700,000 worldwide).

As Jahangard already pointed out, the Ethnologue doesn't actually investigate language typology itself. It just collates the information it receives from other sources, just like Wikipedia really.

As such, it is very well possible that they received one report for Dari (i.e. Behdiani) and one for "Parsi-Dari" (as opposed to Afghan-Dari) and assumed that the two were two different languages.

The Ethnologue report quite clearly states "it is related to Dari," so it does well beget the question, "huh?"

The Ethnologue also clearly states "Comments: 'Parsee' is the name of the ethnic group. Zoroastrian," which also warrants a "huh?"

And the Ethnologue also clearly states "reported to not be inherently intelligible with Parsi of India (etc)," which is no doubt because there is no such thing as the "Parsi of India," even if Ethnologue gives it its own language code.

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>>"There are plenty of sources about the Iranian ancestry of the language spoken by some Parsi's in India."

Irrelevant to the topic at hand, but now thats a "wild statement." So very wild that you shot yourself in the foot while taking aim. :) Parsi Gujarati is not "shudh" Gujarati, but its still very much Gujarati, and - with a little effort - mutually intelligible with the Gujarati that is taught in schools. Like Scots English and English English I suppose. No "plenty of sources" for something else either.

Are you sure that you are not confusing the Parsis with the Indian Iranis? These are also predominantly Zoroastrians, but historically distinct from the Parsis.

>> "Now-a-days Dari (Zoroastrian) seems to be more known from members of the communities who have fled Iran than from sources within Iran"

Actually, everything we know about Dari (Zoroastrian) is based on studies of the native speakers in central Iran. The primary contributor to the 'Dari (Zoroastrian)' is one of the two principal scholars involved in those studies.

-- Fullstop (talk) 00:58, 9 December 2007 (UTC)

I understand that most of the Parsis of India now speak a Gujarati dialect at home, but that this is a relatively recent(?) change. Do you have any citations on this? --Bejnar (talk) 22:39, 8 December 2007 (UTC)

This discussion of the Indian Parsis belongs on that talk page, so I will take it there.--Bejnar (talk) 22:45, 8 December 2007 (UTC)

no, its not a recent development. Adoption of Gujarati was (so the legend) one of the stipulations for asylum. In fact, the source you yourself cited at the Parsi page unambiguously states (emphasis mine) "When they arrived in India in the seventh century, they willingly made Gujarati, one of Indian languages, their native tongue." -- Fullstop (talk) 01:03, 9 December 2007 (UTC)

@Bejnar: Any news on this Parsi-Dari thing? Did you find anything in Weber? -- Fullstop (talk) 19:37, 21 March 2008 (UTC)

>> No redirect until some consensus is achieved. There are plenty of sources about the Iranian ancestry of the language spoken by some Parsis in India. But that is not the problem here. The problem here is whether there is one or two languages spoken by Zoroastrian remnants in Iran.

There is only one. Im not sure of a source where one would find this (since its a bit of a negative claim), but as one of two people who have conducted fieldwork on Dari in Iran, I can say that Ethnologue is in error here. I think they got the Iranian Zoroastrians confused with the Parsis in India, of whom there could easily be 350,000 (though Im not sure of the exact number). I would suggest that this page be redirected to the disambiguation page on Dari. --Maziart (talk) 02:24, 18 August 2008 (UTC)

Done. -- Fullstop (talk) 14:26, 18 August 2008 (UTC)

ps: Your 2004 fieldwork aside, are you still working with the language? (together with Farudi?)

Yes, though not through fieldwork. Were working through our data and notes, and sometimes working with some speakers in the US.--Maziart (talk) 17:51, 18 August 2008 (UTC)

Requested move 15 May 2015

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the move request was: moved. Jenks24 (talk) 04:34, 15 June 2015 (UTC)

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Dari language (Zoroastrian) → Zoroastrian Dari language – https://www.ethnologue.com/language/gbz --Relisted. George Ho (talk) 23:02, 23 May 2015 (UTC) Mjbmr (talk) 13:53, 15 May 2015 (UTC)

• The real problem here is that Afghan Persian should not be located at Dari language. There is absolutely no justification for that. If the so-called "Dari language" page was moved to its appropriate title, this could properly be placed at "Dari language" without any disambiguation. RGloucester — ☎ 14:06, 15 May 2015 (UTC)
• Strong Support per WP:NATURALNESS and per WP:NATURAL disambiguation. The word "Dari" alone is mostly associated with the Dari language of Afghanistan, which is actually an eastern dialect of the Southwestern Iranian Persian language, and an important lingua franca and official language in the country. To refer to the Northwestern Iranian Dari, i.e. the lesser known language spoken by the Zoroastrians, the WP:PRECISE and natural way is to refer to it as "Zoroastrian Dari language". Khestwol (talk) 15:58, 15 May 2015 (UTC)

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The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.