December 29th, 2006

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The Long View
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Where is Persia, and What Language Do They Speak There?

Back in high school, I had classmates who described themselves as ‘Persian’. Of course, there’s no country called ‘Persia’ anymore, so it always baffled me. In addition to English, these Persians spoke a language called ‘Farsi’.

I need to confess my ignorance on this: I don’t know where Persia was (or is, in the imagination of its former occupants). I also, generally speaking, don’t know what languages are spoken in sundry Middle Eastern nations. This blog post will act as a little research exercise for me, to get a better grip on the answers to these questions.

From the Wikipedia entry on the Persian people:

Persians are the main ethnic group of Iran and are the majority and dominant ethnic group of Iran. In addition, Persians are found as minorities in other countries, particularly Uzbekistan, Afghanistan, and Tajikistan, though in these countries they are usually thought of as sub-groups. Significant numbers of Persians also reside outside of Iran, with the largest communities found in the United States, Germany, England, Canada, Kuwait, Turkey and UAE. Bahrain, Iraq, Kuwait, and the UAE also have large populations of Persian descendents, referred to as Ajamis.

Well that’s pretty clear. A non-Persian recently pointed out to me that those of Iranian descent who aren’t keen on being identified first as Iranian. I don’t know how accurate that is. Here, by the way, is what the Persian empire looked like at its height.

Now, let’s talk languages. What do they speak where? From the CIA World Factbook, here are the major languages spoken per country:

Iran: Persian and Persian dialects 58%, Turkic and Turkic dialects 26%, Kurdish 9%
Iraq: Arabic, Kurdish (official in Kurdish regions), Assyrian, Armenian
Syria: Arabic (official); Kurdish, Armenian, Aramaic, Circassian widely understood; French, English somewhat understood
Lebanon: Arabic (official), French, English, Armenian
Israel: Hebrew (official), Arabic used officially for Arab minority, English most commonly used foreign language
Jordan: Arabic (official), English widely understood among upper and middle classes
Afghanistan: Afghan Persian or Dari (official) 50%, Pashtu (official) 35%, Turkic languages (primarily Uzbek and Turkmen) 11%, 30 minor languages (primarily Balochi and Pashai) 4%, much bilingualism
Saudi Arabia: Arabic

And what, by the way, is Farsi? It’s the local name for the Persian language.

Well that clears things up a bit. The mad language mix of Afghanistan reflects the difficulty everybody has conquering and controlling that region.

Comments: 15 Responses so far

Joe Clark
December 29th, 2006
1:50 pm

Wait till you find out that Persians ain’t Arabs and that Farsi is only tangentially related to Arabic.

For extra credit, look up Iranians in L.A.

For additional credit, cite the one and only correct pronunciation of “Iranian.”

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jo
December 30th, 2006
4:17 am

I had the same questions about “Persia” as well. It always bugged me that people identified themselves as being from a non-country; in the back of my mind I always felt people might a well be saying they were from Narnia.

When I first met my boyfriend one clue of the good things to come was that he identified himself as Iranian straight out… Now I’m learning a few words in Farsi.

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Andrea Coutu
December 30th, 2006
3:13 pm

Farsi is also known as Parsi.

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Frenek
December 8th, 2007
10:58 am

I don’t see anything wrong with identifying with being Persian and not Iranian. Particularly people who immigrated to North America before Persia “became” Iran. When I lived in Los Angeles there were many people who were Persian as that is where there parents had come from or they still had a strong tie to that designation when they left Iran…which they still thought of as Persia. Just because you live in a region that experiences what you’d like to think is stability doesn’t mean that everyone has to like what some bureaucrat has decided to call the country. People told me they were Persian, fine with me. Americans, always wanting things to be so neat and tidy. Dildos

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usa Reply:
December 2nd, 2008 at 12:02 am

Wow, so pompous and judgemental. You know sooo much about Americans. Your a joke. Wow, you can actually generalize what we americans are thinking. Sounds like bullshit European bias to me. Your logic is faulty at best. There are many Americans who take SERIOUS offense to such ignorant and rude comments. Just because the rest of the world is attempting to villify us, which by the way is the LARGEST GROSS EXHIBITION OF HYPOCRACY TO DATE, doesnt mean the there are not intelligent and articulate individauls who have pride in this country, and who subsequently hate all the parasides who feed off this country and yets disrespect it and its people at every turn.

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Leah Reply:
March 6th, 2009 at 3:21 pm

I agree with Frenek! Why the hell do you care how they identify themselves. It’s their choice. Build a bridge and get over it.

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Marcus
January 1st, 2008
5:35 am

Frenek…if you don’t like it, get the hell out. No need for name calling.

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Aaron
April 25th, 2008
3:39 pm

A LOT of American’s are Dildos…but not all Dildos are American!

The nice thing about the America is that if you don’t like it, you can bitch about it and try to make changes. The not so nice thing about it is the overwhelming majority of born and bred Americans that can’t seem to think their way out of a bucket - and they LIKE IT THAT WAY! Hmmm…

Nice post. I’d always wondered about the whole Persia thing after I’d met someone and could NOT find it on a map.

Thanks!

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Gabe Reply:
March 1st, 2009 at 5:23 pm

Aaron, you are a complete moron. Ignorant fools like yourself should avoid posting any type of comments on the internet. This would allow for more space for educated people to discuss issues and make relivant statements.

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sam
February 10th, 2009
11:02 pm

Persia was a name created by the Greeks to refer to the country of Iran. The Iranians themselves called their country Iran from the beginning. This is similar to how Germans call their country Deutschland. In 1935 The shah of Iran asked the rest of the world to use the local name to refer to the country.

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Laurie
April 2nd, 2009
6:45 am

I have a friend who has told me he was from Persia. He has been in the US since he was a child but I (not really knowing where Persia was) wonder if he doesn’t say Iran because of how a lot of people react to someone from Iran.

He acts just as much as an American as I do. He just t

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kiarash
April 10th, 2009
9:03 am

hi
I am persian if any one have questions can ask me.
we say to our country pars(iran) and we are parsian and in english you say persian.
persia is in the north of persian gulf and thesouth of caspian sea. we have a old country
we have duildings from 3000y ago.

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Katherine
June 24th, 2009
1:04 pm

Maybe I’m crazy, but it seems like it would be a good idea for people who are accusing others of ignorance to at least spell simple words in their posts correctly.

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Koszegi
July 1st, 2009
3:45 am

I don’t really see why anyone would care if someone said they were Iranian or not a place is a place no matter what the politics or religion are like. And the people are still people. And you know who are pretending to be someone else recently?? The Americans ha! Some Americans while traveling are wearing Canadian flags everywhere so people don’t dislike them. Being Canadian I am pretty not happy, if you are wearing our flag just don’t make people hate it like yours!

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Sara
October 17th, 2009
5:29 am

Hi,
I am also an Iranian living in UAE. the main reason i am referring to myself as Persian is the minute i introduce myself to Europeans or Americans (Not All) they start to tell me words in Arabic like hi and how are you, that is why i just say i am Persian. First because we are not Arab and we do not speak Arabic. (no offense. i do speak Arabic) and we want peaople to know that and the reason we take pride in our country is because of Cyrus and his Cylinder the world’s first declaration of human rights. you can check it out here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cyrus_cylinder

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