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Azerbaijani language
*** Shopping-Tip: Azerbaijani language
{{Infobox Language
|name=Azerbaijani
|nativename=AzÉ™rbaycan dili, Ð?зәрбајҹан дили, آذربايجان ديلی
|pronunciation=/azærbajʤan dili/
|states=
Republic of Azerbaijan,
Iran,
Georgia (country) Georgia,
Russia,
Iraq,
Turkey
|speakers=23–30 million
|familycolor=Altaic
|fam1=
Altaic languages Altaic ''(disputed)''
|fam2=
Turkic languages Turkic
|fam3=Southern Turkic
|script=
Latin alphabet and, formerly,
Cyrillic alphabet (
Azerbaijani alphabet Azerbaijani variants)
|nation=
Republic of Azerbaijan
|iso1=az|iso2=aze
|lc1=aze|ld1=Azerbaijani (generic)|ll1=none
|lc2=azj|ld2=North Azerbaijani|ll2=none
|lc3=azb|ld3=South Azerbaijani|ll3=none
|lc4=klj|ld4=Khalaj ''(disputed)''|ll4=Khalaj language
|lc5=qxq|ld5=Qashqa'i|ll5=Qashqai language
|lc6=slq|ld6=Salchuq|ll6=Salchuq language}}
The '''Azerbaijani''' language, also called '''Azeri''', '''Azari''', '''Azeri Turkish''', or '''Azerbaijani Turkish''', is the
official language of
Republic of Azerbaijan.
It is called '''Az{{IPA|É™}}rbaycan dili''' in Azerbaijani. Some dialects of the language are spoken in many parts of
Iran (but most notably in the northwestern areas, known as
Iranian Azerbaijan), where it is the most dominant language and
lingua franca for minority languages to the area such as
Kurdish language Kurdish,
Armenian language Armenian and
Taleshi language Taleshi. Iran is home for the majority of Azeri speakers in the world. The language is also spoken in
Russia's
Republic of Dagestan, south-eastern
Georgia (country) Georgia, northern
Iraq, and eastern
Turkey.
There are approximately 23 to 30 million native Azerbaijani speakers (Circa 16 to 23 million in Iran and 7 million in Azerbaijan Republic and 800,000 on other smaller communities). It is a
Turkic languages Turkic language of Oghuz branch, closely related to
Turkish language Turkish and also historically influenced by
Persian language Persian and
Arabic language Arabic languages.
History and evolution
: ''For the languages spoken in Azerbaijan before the Turks' arrival, see
Languages of Azerbaijan.''
The Azerbaijani language of today was brought in from
Central Asia by the
Oghuz Seljuk Turks.
It gradually supplanted the previous Iranian languages -
Tat language Tat and
Pahlavi language Pahlavi in the south, and a variety of
Caucasian languages, particularly
Udi language Udi, further north - and had become the dominant language before the
Safavid dynasty; however, minorities in both the Republic of Azerbaijan and Iran continue to speak the earlier
Iranian languages to this day, and Pahlavi and
Persian language Persian loanwords are numerous in Azerbaijani.
Azerbaijani became a
literary language early on, with some works from as early as the 11th century. The Russian conquest of Northern Azerbaijan 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
Arabic alphabet to
Latin alphabet Latin to
Cyrillic alphabet Cyrillic - while Iranian Azeris continued to use Arabic as they always had. After independence, the Republic of Azerbaijan decided to switch again, to the Latin script, following the Turkish model.
Literature
''Main article'':
Azerbaijani literature
Classical literature in Azerbaijani was formed in
11th century based on
Tabrizi and
Shirvani 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, ''
Akinchi Æ?kinçi'' was published in
1875. During the
Soviet Union period, Azerbaijani was often used as a
lingua-franca between the
Turkic peoples Turkic people of the Union.
In mid-19th century it was taught in schools of
Baku,
Ganja (city) Ganja,
Sheki,
Tbilisi, and
Yerevan. Since
1845, it has also been taught in the
University of St. Petersburg in
Russia.
Famous literacy works in Azerbaijani are
The book of Dede Qorqud (which
UNESCO celebrated its 1300th anniversary in
1998, written in an early
Oghuz Turkic dialect),
Epic of Köroğlu Koroğlu,
Leyli and Majnun, and
Heydar Babaya Salam. Important poets and writers of the Azerbaijani language include
Imadeddin Nasimi,
Muhammed Fuzuli (the first poet to write extensively in Azerbaijani, but also in Persian),
Hasanoglu Izeddin, Shah
Ismail I (the
Azeri king),
Khurshud Banu Natavan (female poet),
Mirza Fatali Akhundov,
Mirza Sabir (satirist),
Bakhtiar Vahabzade, and
Mohammad Hossein Shahriar (who has more poems in Persian than in Azerbaijani).
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. The population size of
Turkic languages Turkic speaking ethnic groups, are estimated to be much higher in Iran than official publications.
Here is the population size of Azeri speakers in
Azerbaijan and
Iran, according to two major source. Their estimation differs from 23,4 to 30 million within two main countries. This total does not include the Azeri speakers in
Iraq,
Afghanistan,
Turkey,
Georgia (country) Georgia,
Dagestan and other smaller pockets within the Middle East and Russia. [http://www.ethnologue.com/show_language.asp?code=azb Ethnologue] adds 864,000 for the speakers out of Iran and Republics of Azerbaijan
{|
!Source
(where given)||Total population||% Azeri||Number of speakers
|-
|[http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/geos/aj.html#People CIA Facts Book on Azerbaijan]||7,911,974||90.6% ||7,168,248
|-
|[http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/geos/ir.html#People CIA Facts Book on Iran]||68,017,860||24%||16,324,286
|-
| || || ||'''23,492,534 total'''
|-
|[http://www.ethnologue.com/show_language.asp?code=azj Ethnologue on Azerbaijan]|| || ||6,069,453
|-
|[http://www.ethnologue.com/show_language.asp?code=azb Ethnologue on Iran]|| || ||23,500,000
|-
| || || ||'''29,569,453 total'''
|}
'''Regions where Azerbaijani is spoken by significant group of people: '''
*Azerbaijani (North Dialect)[http://www.ethnologue.com/show_language.asp?code=azj 1]
Azerbaijan, and southern
Dagestan, along the
Caspian coast in the southern
Caucasus Mountains. Also spoken in
Armenia,
Estonia,
Georgia (country) Georgia,
Kazakhstan,
Kyrgyzstan,
Russia (Asia),
Turkmenistan,
Uzbekistan.
*Azerbaijani (South Dialect) [http://www.ethnologue.com/show_language.asp?code=azb 2]
East Azerbaijan and
West Azerbaijan,
Ardebil,
Zanjan, and part of Markazi 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.
Phonology
Based on information at [http://www.azeri.org/Azeri/az_learn/latin_az_sounds.html], Azerbaijani
phonology appears to be:
Consonants
{| class="wikitable"
!colspan="2"| ||bilabial||dental||alveolar||velar||uvular||glottal
|-
!rowspan="2"|stops||voiceless
|{{IPA|p}}||{{IPA|t}}|| ||{{IPA|k}}||{{IPA|q}}||
|-
!voiced
|{{IPA|b}}||{{IPA|d}}|| ||{{IPA|g}}|| ||
|-
!rowspan="2"|affricates||voiceless
| || ||{{IPA|tʃ}}|| || ||
|-
!voiced
| || ||{{IPA|dÊ’}}|| || ||
|-
!rowspan="2"|fricatives||voiceless
|{{IPA|f}}||{{IPA|s}}||{{IPA|ʃ}}||{{IPA|x}}|| ||{{IPA|h}}
|-
!voiced
|{{IPA|v}}||{{IPA|z}}||{{IPA|Ê’}}||{{IPA|É£}}|| ||
|-
!colspan="2"|nasals
|{{IPA|m}}||{{IPA|n}}|| || || ||
|-
!colspan="2"|lateral
| ||{{IPA|l}}|| || || ||
|-
!colspan="2"|rhotic
| ||{{IPA|r}}|| || || ||
|}
Vowels
{| class="wikitable"
!rowspan="2"| ||colspan="2"|front||colspan="2"|central||colspan="2"|back
|-
!unrounded||rounded||unrounded||rounded||unrounded||rounded
|-
!high
|{{IPA|i}}||{{IPA|y}}||colspan="2"| ||{{IPA|ɯ}}||{{IPA|u}}
|-
!mid
|{{IPA|e}}||{{IPA|Å“}}||colspan="2"| || ||{{IPA|o}}
|-
!low
|{{IPA|æ}}|| ||colspan="2" style="text-align:center"|{{IPA|a}}||colspan="2"|
|}
Alphabets
Officially, Azerbaijani now uses
Latin alphabet, but the "Soviet"
Cyrillic alphabet is still in wide use: see
Azerbaijani alphabet. There is a one-to-one correspondence between the Latin and Cyrillic alphabets for Azerbaijani (although the Cyrillic alphabet has a different order):
(Aa Ð?а), (Æ?É™ Ó˜Ó™), (Bb Бб), (Cc Ò¸Ò¹), (Çç Чч), (Dd Дд), (Ee Ее), (Ff Фф), (Gg ÒœÒ?), (Ğğ Ò’Ò“), (Hh ÒºÒ»), (Xx Хх), (Iı Ыы), (Ä°i Ии), (Jj Жж), (Kk Кк), (Qq Гг), (Ll Лл), (Mm Мм), (Nn Ð?н), (Oo Оо), (Öö Ó¨Ó©), (Pp Пп), (Rr Рр), (Ss СÑ?), (Şş Шш), (Tt Тт), (Uu Уу), (Üü Ò®Ò¯), (Vv Вв), (Yy Јј), (Zz Зз).
Before
1929, Azerbaijani was only written in the
Arabic alphabet. 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
Arabic alphabet, although the spelling and orthography is not yet standardized.
Image:New Turkic alphabets.jpg thumb|380px|Azerbaijan Latin alphabets
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
During the initial period of the Republic of Azerbaijan's independence, the official language of Azerbaijan was called "''Türk dili''" ("Turkish"), but since
1994 the older name of the language, "''Azərbaycan dili''" ("Azerbaijani"), has been re-established. The most important literary magazine of the language published in Iran, ''Varliq'', uses the English term "Turkish" and the Persian term "''torki''" for the language. Most
Iranians casually call the language ''Torki'', distinguishing it from the
Turkey's official language, Turkish, by calling the latter a term which can be translated as ''Istanbuli Turkish''. Some people also consider "Azerbaijani" a dialect of a greater "Turkish" language and call it "Azerbaijani-Turkish".
International Organization for Standardization ISO and the
Unicode Consortium, call the language "Azerbaijani".
Note
: ''The term "Azeri language" is also sometimes used to refer to a dialect of the
Tat language spoken in Azerbaijan or to the
Ancient Azari language.''
See also
*
Historical linguistics
*
Language families and languages
*
Iranian languages
External links
{{Interwiki|code=az}}
-
azeri.org
-
Azerbaijani Language by Ethnologue
-
Pre-Islamic roots
-
Azerbaijani-Turkish language in Iran by Ahmad Kasravi
Category:Languages of Azerbaijan
Category:Languages of Iran
Category:Languages of Russia
Category:Languages of Turkey
Category:Turkic languages
ar:لغة أذربيجانية
az:Azərbaycan dili
bg:Ð?зербайджанÑ?ки език
br:Azereg
ca:Àzeri
de:Aserbaidschanische Sprache
et:Aserbaidžaani keel
el:ΑζεÏ?ική γλώσσα
es:Idioma azerÃ
eo:AzerbajÄ?ana lingvo
fa:ترکی آذربایجانی
fr:Azéri
ko:ì•„ì œë¥´ë°”ì?´ìž”ì–´
id:Bahasa Azeri
he:×?זרית
ka:�ზერბ�იჯ�ნული ენ�
lv:AzerbaidžÄ?ņu valoda
ms:Bahasa Azeri
nl:Azeri
ja:アゼル�イジャン語
pl:Język azerski
pt:LÃngua azeri
ru:Ð?зербайджанÑ?кий Ñ?зык
fi:Azerin kieli
sv:Azerbajdzjanska
tr:Azerice
uk:Ð?зербайджанÑ?ька мова
zh:阿塞拜疆è¯
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