Hazaragi is an eastern dialect and variety of the Persian language that is spoken by the Hazara people.

Classification

Hazaragi is a member of the Iranian branch of the Indo-European language family. It is an eastern variety of Persian and closely related to Dari, one of the two official Languages of Afghanistan. The primary differences between Dari and Hazaragi are the accents and Hazaragi's greater array of many Turkic and Mongolic words and loanwords Despite these differences, the two dialects are mutually intelligible. In Daykundi (former Uruzgan), Hazaragi has a significant admixture of Turkic influence in the language via Karluk.

Geographic distribution and diaspora

Hazaragi is spoken by the Hazara people, who mainly live in Afghanistan (predominantly in the Hazarajat (Hazaristan) region, as well as other Hazara-populated areas of Afghanistan), with a significant population in Pakistan (particularly Quetta) and Iran (particularly Mashhad), and by Hazaras in eastern Uzbekistan, northern Tajikistan, the Americas, Europe, and Australia. The number of Hazaragi speakers in Iran increased significantly due to the influx of refugees from Afghanistan where there are an estimated 399,000 speakers in the country as of 2021. In recent years, a substantial population of Hazara refugees has settled in Australia, prompting the Department of Immigration and Citizenship to move towards official recognition of the Hazaragi language. Currently, NAATI (National Accreditation Authority for Translators and Interpreters) holds interpreting tests for Hazaragi as a distinct language, noting in test materials that Hazaragi varies by dialect, and that any dialect of Hazaragi may be used in interpreter testing as long as it would be understood by the average speaker. The test materials also note that Hazaragi in some locations has been significantly influenced by surrounding languages and that the use of non-Hazaragi words assimilated from neighboring languages would be penalized in testing.

History

Persian and Islam

The Persian language became so much part of the religion of Islam that it almost went wherever Islam took roots. Persian entered, in this way, into the very faith and thought of the people embracing Islam throughout South Asia.

Turkic and Mongolic influence

Over time, Turkic and Mongolic languages penetrated as living languages amongst Hazara people, and Hazaragi contains many Turkic and Mongolic words and loanwords.

Grammatical structure

The grammatical structure of Hazaragi is practically identical to that of the Kabuli dialect of Persian.

Phonology

can also approach the sound or. As a group of eastern Persian varieties which are considered the more formal and classical varieties of Persian, Hazaragi retains the voiced fricative, and the bilabial articulation of has borrowed the (rare) retroflexes and ; as in buṭ (meaning "boot") vs. but (meaning "idol") (cf. Persian bot); and rarely articulates. The convergence of voiced uvular stop (ق) and voiced velar fricative (غ) in Western Persian (probably under the influence of Turkic languages) is still kept separate in Hazara. Diphthongs include, , and (cf. Persian ab, āb, ûw). The vocalic system is typically eastern Persian, characterized by the loss of length distinction, the retention of mid vowels, and the rounding of and, alternating with its merger with , or (cf. Persian ān). Stress is dynamic and similar to that in Dari and Tajik varieties of Persian, and not variable. It generally falls on the last syllable of a nominal form, including derivative suffixes and several morphological markers. Typical is the insertion of epenthetic vowels in consonant clusters (as in pašm to póšum; "wool") and final devoicing (as in ḵût; "self, own"). only occurs infrequently and among more educated speakers. can be heard as either a trill or a tap. // can also range to uvular sounds [].

Nominal morphology

The most productive derivative marker is -i, and the plural markers are -o for the inanimate (as in kitab-o, meaning "books"; cf. Persian -hā) and -û for the animate (as in birar-û, meaning "brothers"; cf. Persian -ān). The emphatic vocative marker is û or -o, the indefinite marker is -i, and the specific object marker is -(r)a. The comparative marker is -tar (as in kalû-tar, meaning "bigger"). Dependent adjectives and nouns follow the head noun and are connected by -i (as in kitab-i mamud, meaning "the book of Maḥmud"). Topicalized possessors precede the head noun marked by the resumptive personal suffix (as in Zulmay ayê-ši, literally "Zulmay her mother"). Prepositions include, in addition to the standard Persian ones, ḵun(i) (meaning "with, using", da (meaning "in"; cf. Persian dar); the latter often replaces ba (meaning "to") in dative function. Loaned postpositions include comitative -qati (meaning "together with") and (az) -worî (meaning "like"). Interrogatives typically function also as indefinite (as in kudam, meaning "which, someone"). The inflection (u,o) that Hazaras use to pluralize nouns is also found in Avesta, Yashts such as Aryo.

Particles, conjunctions, modals, and adverbials

These include atê/arê, meaning "yes"; amma or wali, meaning "but"; balki, meaning "however"; šaydi, meaning "perhaps"; ale, meaning "now"; and wuḵt-a, meaning "then". These are also marked by distinctive initial stress.

Verb morphology

The imperfective marker is mi- (assimilated variants: m-, mu-, m-, mê-; as in mi-zan-um, "I hit, I am hitting"). The subjunctive and imperative marker is bi- (with similar assimilation). The negation is na- (as in na-mi-zad-um, "I was not hitting"). These usually attract stress.

Tenses

The tense, mood, and aspect system is typically quite different from Western Persian. The basic tense system is threefold: present-future, past, and remote (pluperfect). New modal paradigms developed in addition to the subjunctives: Moreover, all past and remote forms have developed imperfective forms marked by mi-. There are doubts about several of the less commonly found, or recorded, forms, in particular those with ḵot. However, the systematic arrangement of all forms according to their morphological, as well as semantic, function shows that those forms fit well within the overall pattern. The system may tentatively be shown as follows (all forms are 1st sing), leaving out complex compound forms such as zada ḵot mu-buda baš-um. In the assumptive, the distinction appears to be not between present versus past, but indefinite versus definite. Also, similar to all Persian varieties, the imperfective forms in mi-, and past perfect forms, such as mi-zad-um and zada bud-um, are used in irreal conditional clauses and wishes; e.g., kaški zimi qulba kadagi mu-but, "If the field would only be/have been plowed!" Modal verbs, such as tan- ("can"), are constructed with the perfect participle; e.g., ma bû-r-um, da čaman rasid-a ḵot tanist-um, "I shall go, and may be able to get to Čaman". Participial nominalization is typical, both with the perfect participle (e.g., kad-a, "(having) done") and with the derived participle with passive meaning kad-ag-i, "having been done" (e.g., zimin-i qulba kada-ya, "The field is ploughed"; zamin-i qulba (na-)šuda-ra mi-ngar-um, "I am looking at a plowed/unplowed field"; imrûz [u ḵondagi] tikrar mu-kun-a, "Today he repeats (reading) what he had read"). The gerundive (e.g., kad-an-i, "to be done") is likewise productive, as in yag čiz, ki uftadani baš-a, ma u-ra qad-dist-ḵu girift-um, tulḡa kad-um, "One object, that was about to fall, I grabbed, and held it". The clitic -ku or -ḵu topicalizes parts of speech, -di the predicate; as in i-yši raft, ma-ḵu da ḵona mand-um, "He himself left; I, though, I stayed".