Outside Iran, in what regions of the world is the Persian language spoken?

darthrevan89

Persian is a member of the Iranian branch of Indo-European languages. There are a number of closely-related varieties of Persian, including: Persian (فارسی), is spoken by about 40 million people, mainly in central and south central Iran. There are a further 2 million speakers in many other countries including Bahrain, Iraq, Oman, Yemen, the UAE and the USA. Dari (درى) is spoken by about 7 million people in Afghanistan and Pakistan. Tajiki (Тоҷики / تاجيكى) is spoken in Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Russia, Turkmenistan and Ukraine by about 4.4 million people. http://www.omniglot.com/writing/persian.htm Jul 05 08, 7:31 AM

zbeckabee

I'm adding the Language Family Trees of Indo-European, Indo-Iranian, Iranian, Western, Southwestern, Persian. Persian (10) -- AIMAQ [AIQ] (Afghanistan) BUKHARIC [BHH] (Israel) DARWAZI [DRW] (Afghanistan) DEHWARI [DEH] (Pakistan) DZHIDI [DZH] (Israel) FARSI, EASTERN [PRS] (Afghanistan) FARSI, WESTERN [PES] (Iran) HAZARAGI [HAZ] (Afghanistan) PAHLAVANI [PHV] (Afghanistan) TAJIKI [PET] (Tajikistan) The following link elaborates on the above: http://www.ethnologue.com/14/show_family.asp?subid=1000 Once on site -- Click the three letters to the right of the language (i.e. -- Farsi, Western CLICK [PES] (Iran) Jul 05 08, 8:55 AM

author

If I may add: Quote: Dari (Persian: دری, pronounced [dari]) or Persian Dari (Persian: فارسی دری, pronounced [farsi dari]) is the official name for the Persian language spoken in Afghanistan, and is also a regional language in Tajikistan, Pakistan and Turkmenistan. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dari_%28Persian%29 Also a small note on Tajiki, which is related to Persian dialects spoken in Afghanistan and Iran. Quote: The language has diverged from Persian as spoken in Afghanistan and Iran, as a result of political borders, the standardisation process, and the influence of Russian and neighbouring Turkic languages. The standard language is based on the north-western dialects of Tajik (region of old major city of Samarkand), which have been somewhat influenced by the neighbouring Uzbek language as a result of geographical proximity. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tajiki Jul 05 08, 10:11 AM

gentlegiant17

Avesta, still used by Zoroastrian (Parsi) priests in their communities (the biggest one in Mumbai, India) may be added as well. Jul 05 08, 10:22 AM

author

Avestani is also correct. In addition these languages are related to Persian: Zazaki, Kurdish, Parthian, Balochi, Pashto, Mazandarani. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Template:Iranian_Languages Jul 05 08, 10:26 AM