i have been living in santa monica for the last 10 years, i went to high-school in tehran and even though both my parents were from tabriz, i never bothered to learn their language, plus i didn’t really have a need for it since i lived the first 17 years of my life in tehran which meant that i didn’t need to learn their language.
But recently i have been wanting to learn Azarbaijani Turkish and in order to do that i asked my mom to QUIT TALKING TO ME IN FARSI, so we have chiefly been talking to each other in IRANIAN TURKI for the last month or so but the problem is that SINCE THIS LANGUAGE WAS NEVER STANDARDIZED AND TAUGHT AT SCHOOLS IN IRAN, THERE’S NO STANDARD DICTIONARY OR GRAMMER BOOK ON IT, and those other books and materials that are available merely COPY THE NORTHEN BAKU DIALECT. so all this stuff has led me to read and find out more about the OTHER LANGUAGES in Iran and i have realized that PEOPLE IN IRAN’S NON-FARSI AREAS HAVE A HIGHER ILLITRACY RATE mainly because they are unable to study in their own language.
now i was never really aware of this when i was in tehran because i was in a farsi-speaking city and didn’t really care much or know much about the rest of that country, but eversince i started learning Azarbaijani, I BECAME AWARE OF THIS PROBLEM AND HAVE TALKED TO OTHER PEOPLE ABOUT IT. If you haven’t noticed already, THERE ARE QUITE A FEW SEPARATIST WEBSITES whose main reason for their agenda has been LANGUAGE. I however, personally think that EVERY COUNTRY should have a common language but cases like INDIA AND SWITZERLAND could be pretty usefull to iran’s language problem since they both have managed to keep it all together while allowing all those other languages to function at the same time.
i sympathize with IRAN’S NON-FARSI people and believe that they should have some right to reading and writing in their own language either through PRIVATE SCHOOLS and special courses designed for those non-farsi areas of Iran or through the PUBLIC EDUCATION SYSTEM’s custom-made classes and institutions for those areas. this subject is controversial yet very fascinating, IF ANY ONE HAS ANY GOOD IDEAS PLEASE SHARE THEM.
THANK YOU.
