Mehr Ali Newid, Gregor Thurmair. Wörterbuch Farsi-Dari / Dari-Farsi mit deutschen und englischen Entsprechungen / Dictionary Farsi-Dari / Dari-Farsi with German and English equivalents
Mehr Ali Newid, Gregor Thurmair. Wörterbuch Farsi-Dari / Dari-Farsi mit deutschen und englischen Entsprechungen / Dictionary Farsi-Dari / Dari-Farsi with German and English equivalents. Hamburg, Buske, 2023, 793 p.
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1Comparative lexicology is a major desideratum in the study of modern Iranian languages. This is especially noticeable in the case of Persian, where the emergence of nation-states (Iran, Afghanistan, and Tajikistan) during the 20th century has driven linguistic divergence. The development of broadcasting, publishing, and politically motivated language planning has led to language standards for Persian in Iran (Farsi), Dari in Afghanistan and Tajik in the former Soviet Union. However, due to increasing digital-media networking and social factors such as transregional migration, processes of linguistic convergence can now be observed in the Persian-speaking world. It is against this dynamic sociolinguistic backdrop that Mehr Ali Newid, in collaboration with Gregor Thurmair, has produced a dictionary that compares the modern vocabularies of Iranian Farsi and Afghan Dari.
2The dictionary is divided into two parts. The first part (Farsi-Dari) lists lexemes and lexical units of Farsi that are either unknown or uncommon in Dari, or have different meanings (p. 29-405). The second part (Dari-Farsi) presents lexemes and lexical units of Dari that are either unknown or uncommon in Farsi or differ in form and meaning (p. 407-781), i.e. words existing in both Farsi and Dari in the same meaning are usually not included in the present dictionary. Each lemma includes a transcription, lexical equivalents in the other variety, and the meanings in German and English. Different meanings of a lexeme are listed as separate entries rather than being grouped under the same lemma.
3In selecting the lexemes, the authors assert that the divergence between written and spoken language is greater in Dari than in Farsi. They describe Dari as having a “very extensive Afghan vernacular” (p. 10), which explains why more explanatory information is provided for Dari words than for Farsi words. In the first part of the dictionary, Dari equivalents for Farsi words are given with references, whereas the authors felt this was unnecessary for the Farsi vocabulary due to the large number of available dictionaries (p. 7). However, most of the sources for the Dari vocabulary are also dictionaries or similar lexicographical references. (Regrettably, the Dari-Russian dictionary by L. N. Kiseleva and V. I. Mikolajčik (1985), widely considered the most authoritative reference for 20th-century Dari, is not used as a reference, although it is listed in the bibliography.)
4The reference to the “very extensive Afghan vernacular” likely also explains the inclusion of dialect-specific vocabulary for Dari (with references to the Badakhshani, Herati, and Hazara dialects), while this is not done for Farsi. This decision seems to be based on the stronger role of the colloquial standard in Iran. However, Afghanistan also has a colloquial standard, which is recognized nationwide and is taught in schools and used in administration and the media. This creates an imbalance in that users can find explanations for dialect-specific words in Afghanistan, but not for regional dialects in Iran.
5It is undoubtedly a difficult task to capture and compare the vocabularies of two language communities, shaped by distinct political, economic, and social conditions of the respective country. The dictionary format limits such an undertaking, which could benefit from a more in-depth analytical study. Moreover, a printed dictionary may struggle to keep pace with the dynamic linguistic developments in the Persian-speaking world. Many words identified as distinctly Iranian are known to a growing number of Dari speakers. Even grammatical forms once considered unique to Farsi are increasingly used by Dari speakers. However, the verb داشتن dāštan, used as an auxiliary verb to form the progressive in Farsi, is not included at all in the dictionary (surely because the basic meaning is the same in both Farsi and Dari). Similarly, the verb رفتن raftan, used as an auxiliary verb in Dari to express ongoing or intensifying actions, is also absent.
6Dictionaries have often been used for political purposes to support specific language policies, which should be kept in mind by anyone attempting to describe the vocabulary of a language or dialect. In some cases, the present dictionary appears not only to describe but also to construct a divergent vocabulary for Farsi and Dari.
7Different transcription systems are used for Farsi and Dari, with discrepancies in vowel representation. While the preservation of the maǧhūl vowels in Dari accounts for some of these differences, the short vowels are transcribed as a, e, and o for Farsi, but their Dari equivalents are rendered as a, i, and u. Additionally, the list of long vowels suggests that there is no long (“constant”) /ī/ in Dari (see p. 13). In some cases, the pronunciation given is not correct, as in the case of نوشیدن, which is given as nōšēdan [no.ʃe.’dan, p. 13] and نوشیدنی (p. 764), both noted with maǧhul ē in the second syllable for Dari, while the actual pronunciation is with ī as in Farsi. Although the introduction states that multiple pronunciation variants are given for Dari words, this principle is not consistently followed. Often, only one pronunciation is given, frequently the one that differs the most from the Iranian Persian pronunciation. For example, a variant with the diphthong ay is always given for the prefix بی ‘without’ in Dari (see, for example, the entry for بی توجهی on p. 101), even though most Dari speakers would pronounce it as bē, or even bī as in Farsi. Similarly, تجارت ‘trade’ is presented as a uniquely Dari word, with the first syllable pronounced to [tu.ʤā.’rat] (p. 493) although a pronunciation as teǧārat, identical to the Iranian pronunciation, is not less common in Afghanistan.
8The dictionary’s introduction does not specify the intended audience, which makes it difficult to assess its practical use. For those engaged in academic study of Persian varieties, it may serve as an important reference. It could also be useful to German and English speakers who are studying Iranian Persian or Afghan Dari at an advanced level. Language activists in the Iranian and Afghan diasporas in the Western world might also benefit from this book. However, the numerous speakers of Farsi and Dari in Iran and Afghanistan will continue to be resort to other dictionaries or digital resources. In this light, the question arises: would it not be fitting to publish such dictionaries also in a globally accessible digital format? Online dictionaries can be continually expanded and adapted and are therefore better suited to keeping up with the rapid changes in language use.
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Référence électronique
Lutz Rzehak, « Mehr Ali Newid, Gregor Thurmair. Wörterbuch Farsi-Dari / Dari-Farsi mit deutschen und englischen Entsprechungen / Dictionary Farsi-Dari / Dari-Farsi with German and English equivalents », Abstracta Iranica [En ligne], Volume 45 | 2023, document 21, mis en ligne le 30 décembre 2024, consulté le 14 janvier 2026. URL : http://journals.openedition.org/abstractairanica/57034 ; DOI : https://doi.org/10.4000/14ari
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