What ethnicity are you if you are Kurdish?
Kurds (Kurdish: کورد ,Kurd) or Kurdish people are an Iranian ethnic group native to the mountainous region of Kurdistan in Western Asia, which spans southeastern Turkey, northwestern Iran, northern Iraq, and northern Syria.
How many dialects of Kurdish are there?
There are two main Kurdish dialects (Kurmanji and Sorani), as well as some peripheral ones (e.g. Pahlewani, Zazaki and Hewrami /Gorani). Kurmanji is the language of the vast majority of Kurds in Turkey, Syria, Armenia, and Azerbaijan, and of a few in Iraq and Iran, with an estimated 15-17 million speakers in total.
Is Kurdish an official language in Iraq?
According to the Article 4 of the Constitution, Arabic and Kurdish are the official languages of Iraq, while three other languages: Turkmen, Syriac and Armenian, are recognized as minority languages.
Do all Kurds share the same language?
The majority of the Kurds speak Kurmanji. Most Kurdish texts are written in Kurmanji and Sorani. Today, the two principal written Kurdish dialects are Kurmanji and Sorani. Sorani is, along with Arabic, one of the two official languages of Iraq and is in political documents simply referred to as “Kurdish”.
Is Kurdish a language or dialect?
Kurdish language, a West Iranian language, one of the Indo-Iranian languages, chiefly spoken in Kurdistan. It ranks as the third largest Iranian language, after Persian and Pashto, and has numerous dialects. It is thought to be spoken by some 20–40 million people.
Do Iraqi Kurds speak Arabic?
ERBIL, Kurdistan Region—The number of Iraqi Kurds who speak Arabic fluently has declined significantly since the 1990s, even though Arabic is the second official language in Kurdistan and the primary language of Iraq. The result is a generation where most people under the age of 35 cannot communicate in Arabic.
Are Kurds circumcised?
A representative of the American Kurdish Information Network in Washington, DC informed the RIC that the great majority of Kurds are Muslims and therefore practice circumcision. As part of a religious ceremony, Muslim males are circumcised at a very young age.
What language do the Kurds speak in Iraq?
Sorani: Central Kurdish Language The Central Kurdish dialect, called Sorani, is spoken by Kurds in parts of Iraq and Iran. Sorani is written with the Arabic script, and borrows the spelling of many words from Arabic, although the pronunciation differs.
Why can’t I learn Kurmanji Kurdish?
Speaking Kurmanji Kurdish in public and private was banned in Turkey from the 1920’s until 1991. It was literally illegal to speak the word “Kurd.” Therefore, there are less resources for learning Kurmanji Kurdish (which is more popular in Turkey) than the other Kurdish languages.
What is the Sorani Kurdish language?
Sorani, while spoken by less than 1/4 of all Kurds, is the dialect with the most well-developed literary tradition in modern times, since an educational system in Sorani Kurdish was allowed to develop, in Iraq for a time, based on the dialect of Sulaymaniyah.
What is the origin of Kurdish?
Kurdish is a Indo-European language as part of the Western Iranian branch with around 40 million speakers worldwide and is spoken predominantly in Turkey, Iraq, Syria, and Iran. There are numerous smaller communities of Kurds in Armenia, Georgia, Azerbaijan, and also parts of Europe.