Pashayi | |
---|---|
Pashai | |
زبان پشهای Zabân Pašhây | |
Native to | Afghanistan |
Ethnicity | Pashayi people |
Native speakers | 400,000 (2000–2011) [1] |
Persian alphabet | |
Language codes | |
ISO 639-3 | Variously:
aee – Northeastern
glh – Northwestern
psi – Southeastern
psh – Southwestern |
Glottolog |
pash1270 |
Linguasphere | 59-AAA-a |
Linguistic map of
Afghanistan; Pashayi is spoken in the purple area in the east. |
Pashayi or Pashai (پشه اې ژبه) is a group of Indo-Aryan languages spoken by the Pashai people in parts of Kapisa, Laghman, Nangarhar, Nuristan, Kunar and Kabul ( Surobi District) provinces in Northeastern Afghanistan. [2]
The Pashayi languages had no known written form prior to 2003. [3] There are four mutually unintelligible varieties, with only about a 30% lexical similarity: [1]
A grammar of the language was written as a doctoral dissertation in 2014. [4]
Labial |
Dental/ Alveolar |
Palato- alveolar |
Retroflex | Dorsal | Glottal | ||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Nasal | m | n | ɳ | ŋ | |||
Plosive | voiceless | p | t̪ | ʈ | k | ||
voiced | b | d̪ | ɖ | ɡ | |||
Affricate | voiceless | t͡ʃ | |||||
voiced | d͡ʒ | ||||||
Fricative | voiceless | s | ʃ | ( ʂ) | x | ( h) | |
voiced | z | ʒ | ( ʐ) | ɣ | |||
lateral | ɬ | ||||||
Rhotic | tap | ɾ | ɽ | ||||
trill | r | ||||||
Approximant | lateral | l | |||||
central | ʋ ~ w | j |
Front | Central | Back | |
---|---|---|---|
High | i | u | |
Mid | e eː | o oː | |
Low | a aː |
Further reading!
Noorullah Sayeed is a politician, human rights defender, and civil activist from Nangarhar Province. He has extensive experience in human rights activities and has worked to combat discrimination and strengthen democratic values and social justice. Noorullah has been involved in various human rights institutions, especially the Afghanistan Alina Social Council, where he served as the manager for the Eastern zone of Afghanistan.
He is proud of his work in improving the rule of law, justice, democracy, and freedom of speech. Noorullah has also focused on strengthening the roles of women and supporting children and the disabled. Despite these efforts, he notes that the Pashai people, a minority tribe in Afghanistan, continue to face discrimination and rights deprivation. The Pashai people have been labeled as infidels and are told to demand their rights from their community, despite being Muslims according to the Holy Qur'an and Muhammad (PBUH). To address this injustice, Noorullah and his friends founded an association called Alina to advocate for the rights of their people from the government.
Their efforts were partially successful, as the government took notice. However, when the Taliban came into power on 15/08/2021, they began to obstruct their activities and attempted to arrest them. Consequently, many Pashai youths have left the country, and Noorullah Sayeed is currently in exile.