Languages of Iran

The current language policy of Iran is addressed in Chapter Two of the Constitution of the Islamic Republic of Iran (Articles 15, 16). It asserts that the Persian language is the lingua franca of the Iranian nation and as such, required for the school system and for all official government communications.[3] In addition, the constitution recognizes the Arabic language as the language of Islam, giving it formal status as the language of religion and regulating its spread within the Iranian national curriculum.[4]

Due to the nation's social and ethnic diversity, the constitution also acknowledges and permits the use of minority languages in the mass media as well as within the schools, in order to teach minority-language literature.[3]

Iran is a culturally diverse country composed of many ethnicities, religions, and languages. According to Minority Rights Group (MRG), though minorities may account for half of Iran’s population, a homogenous national identity rooted in the Persian language and Shi’a Islam has long been imposed upon Iranian citizens, with the effect of the repression, exclusion and marginalization of minority communities.[5] Moreover, despite provisions in Iran’s constitution to the contrary, the use of minority languages in the country is repressed in all aspects of public life, from the media to education. Minority-language publishing houses have found their offices sealed off in recent years.[5]

One can purchase newspapers, books, music tapes, and videos in Azerbaijani and Kurdish, and there are radio and television stations in ethnic areas that broadcast news and entertainment programs in even more languages.

The Iranian branch of Indo-European languages in Central and West Asia which including Iran

Iranian branch of the Indo-European language family make up 78% of the population of Iran, but the Armenian branch included in the group that includes less than 1% population of the Iran.[6] Iranian languages are including Persian, Luri, Kurdish, Gilaki and Mazanderani, and Balochi.[7] The largest group of people in present-day Iran are Persians who speak dialects of the language called Farsi in Persian.[8] The Luri-speaking Lurs live in northern Fars and southern Zagros and Kurdish-speaking Kurds live in the Zagros mountains, north of the Lurs, up to and over the frontiers with Armenia and the Republic of Azerbaijan.[8] While, Gilaki and Mazanderani speakers live in the region of Gilan and Mazandaran in northern Iran, and the Balochi speakers live in southeastern Iran.

Azerbaijan also had an Iranian language called Āḏarī before the spread of the Turkic language, commonly called Azerbaijani, in the region.[9] Also there are small Iranian languages in Iran including Achomi, Tati, Talysh, Gorani, Semnani, Bashkardi, Garmsiri, Sorkhei and Sangsari.

Since the mid-19th century, Armenians had their own schools where Armenian was the only language of instruction and Persian and French were taught as foreign languages. The closure of these schools and their limited reopening have damaged the Armenian language.[10] The Armenian spoken in Iran are Eastern dialect.

The Turkic languages in Central and West Asia which including Iran

Turkic langauges and dialects make up 18% of the population of Iran.[6] Only in few other regions (Caucasus and Southern Siberia) one can find a nearly comparable diversity of Turkic languages as in Persia. The number of their speakers varies from several thousands to several millions. Altogether, one-sixth of today’s Iranian population is turcophone or bilingual.[11]

In Iran, there are two distinct branches of Turkic: Oghuz Turkic languages and dialects that represent the southwestern branch of Turkic, and Khalaj, which presents a tiny branch of its own. Most widely spoken is Azerbaijani.[12] Turkic languages and dialects of Iran icluded Azerbaijani, Qashqai, Khorasani Turkic, Turkmen, Central Oghuz dialect varieties, Sonqori, Afshar and Khalaj.[12][11] Hendrik Boeschoten gives the following estimates for speakers of Turkic languages in Iran, with a total population then of 62 million: Azerbaijani, 13 million; Qashqai, 570,000; Khorasani Turkic, 400,000; Turkmen, 500,000; Khalaj, 28,000. However, Bulut in 2005, estimates 40,000 for Khalaj.[12]

A copy of the Behistun inscription in Aramaic on a papyrus. Aramaic was the lingua franca of the Achaemenid Empire.

Among Afro-Asiatic languages, Arabic speakers make up 2% of the population of Iran, while Aramaic/Assyrian and Hebrew are in the group that includes less than 1%.[6] In Iran, the Afro-Asiatic languages included the Arabic, Aramaic and Hebrew, and all of them are belongs to Semitic branch.

First Aramaic and then Arabic had considerable contact with Iranian languages.[13] Their impact differs. Aramaic was made the official language of communication by Achaemenid ruler Darius the Great, and hence is referred to as Imperial Aramaic, which considerably contributed to the success of the empire. It initiated a literary tradition that continued into Middle Iranian times, finally to be replaced by the various literary languages.[13] Aramaic dialects continued to be spoken in the northwestern regions of Persia by small Christian and Jewish communities, and left their reflexes in the local Jewish-Iranian dialects and local varieties of Judeo-Persian.[13] By contrast, Arabic had become the new administrative and religious-scientific superstrate language after the conquest of Persia in the mid-7th century, when Arabic tribes and administrative groups began to settle throughout Greater Iran for some three hundred years. Of these, only few pockets have remained in eastern and southern Persia, and until recently they had remained virtually unstudied.[13]

Although, after the Arab invasion of Persia in the 7th century, many Arab tribes settled in different parts of Iran, it is the Arab tribes of Khuzestan that have retained their identity in language and culture to the present day and there was a great influx of Arab-speaking immigrants into the province from the 16th to the 19th century, including the migration of the Banu Kaʿb and Banu Lam.[8]

Among Caucasusian languages, Georgian and Circassian included in the group that includes less than 1% population of the Iran.[6] Many thousands of Georgians and Circassians, who were transplanted to Iran by Safavid ruler Abbas the Great were peasants, and they were settled in villages in the Iran hinterland. According to A. F. Stahl, by the early 1900s Geogian were intermarrying with Persians. However, most of them continued to speak Georgian, as is indicated by Basil Nikitin.[14] Circassian was also once widely spoken by the large Circassian minority, but, due to assimilation over the many years, no sizable number of Circassians speak the language anymore.

Windfuhr claimed that Georgians and Circassians were quickly assimilated culturally and linguistically, and even excluded Circassian from the Caucasian languages spoken in Iran.[15]

Brahui is spoken in Baluchestan (as well as the adjacent areas of Afghanistan and Pakistan). The language is the northernmost remnant of the Dravidian languages, which are now found mainly in the southern Indian subcontinent, but may once have been more widely found in Iran.[15]