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Lexical Variation and Semantic Change in Kurdish

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Structural and Typological Variation in the Dialects of Kurdish

Abstract

The chapter examines variation in Kurdish among lexical forms for specific concepts in different regions. The findings can be summarized as follows: there are different degrees to which lexical variation may function as an indicator of linguistic division or transition; while about half of the items in our data are shared between all or most Iranian languages, there are also items that are unique to Kurdish varieties; and extra-linguistic factors that contribute most to lexical variation include geography, political division, population movement, cultural borrowing, and modernization. Finally, semasiological and onomasiological innovations are underlined. The chapter concludes with an account of the implications for further research.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    For example, in Baneh pird and in Merivan (Meriwan) pirt have been recorded to mean ‘house’ when they both mean ‘bridge’; in Mahabad sewz has been recorded to mean ‘green’ where in reality three other expressions, sabz, kesk or şîn, are used to mean ‘green’ in that town; also in Mahabad, bahad is recorded for ‘river’, where people commonly say çom; îçvart has been recorded as ‘never’ (possibly a wrong transcription of the Farsi hîçvaxt), le dêy mizgewteke is inferred to mean ‘there is a mosque in the village’ when this Kurdish utterance actually means ‘in the village of the mosque’. In Bokan, bałê is recorded for ‘car’ instead of maşên or maşîn; mindal is used to denote ‘child’ instead of mindał; êwarê (afternoon/evening) for ‘noon’ instead of nîwerro.

  2. 2.

    Öpengin and Haig (2014) have recorded this item as dêl (p. 153).

  3. 3.

    In central Kurdish /ik/ is a diminutive suffix.

  4. 4.

    Hêmin (2003), the prominent CK poet from Mahabad writes: kiwanê ew rojey ke sercopîm degirt bangim dekird / dom dewê, doy qol be bazne u pence nexsînim dewê (p. 265). In the dictionary Henbane Borine (Hejar 1990, p. 297) defines do as ‘a girl who takes a young man’s hand in dance’.

  5. 5.

    ‘Kurd perîşan maye îro têk de bûn serqot û rot / Dijmin ew dane ber hev dil bi ateş wan disot / Têk li ber topan biriştin kal û xort û bûk û dot / Ger dipirsî tu li halê miletê meqhûrê xot / Horî bedbext û xiflet girt û dil hoşarê kurd’ (my emphasis: http://www.pen-kurd.org/kurdi/mustefa-reshid/taybetmendiyen-helbesten-cegerxwin.html)

  6. 6.

    According to Vazheyab, čam is also an abbreviated form of čašm in Dari: https://www.vajehyab.com/?q=چم&d=en

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Acknowledgments

We are thankful to the editors for their reviews of earlier drafts of this paper, Erik Anonby for providing feedback on an earlier draft, and to the University of Ottawa and Carleton University for supporting this project with a grant.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Carleton University, Ottawa, ON, Canada

    Jaffer Sheyholislami & Rahim Surkhi

Authors
  1. Jaffer Sheyholislami
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  2. Rahim Surkhi
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Jaffer Sheyholislami .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Aston Institute for Forensic Linguistics, Aston University, Birmingham, UK

    Yaron Matras

  2. Department of General Linguistics, University of Bamberg, Bamberg, Germany

    Geoffrey Haig

  3. English Language Department, University of Kurdistan-Hewlêr, Erbil, Kurdistan Region of Iraq, Iraq

    Ergin Öpengin

Appendices

Appendix

Table 1 Data collected by authors from 29 participants
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Table 2 Frequency table for the lexical expressions for child in Kurdish varieties
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Table 3 Frequency for the lexical expressions for girl in Kurdish varieties
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Table 4 Frequency for the lexical expressions for boy in Kurdish varieties
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Table 5 Frequency for the lexical expressions for mountain in Kurdish varieties
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Table 6 Frequency for the lexical expressions for snow in Kurdish varieties
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Table 7 Frequency for the lexical expressions for green in Kurdish varieties
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Table 8 Frequency for the lexical expressions for river in Kurdish varieties
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Table 9 Frequency for the lexical expressions for car in Kurdish varieties
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Table 10 Frequency for the lexical expressions for red in Kurdish varieties
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Table 11 Frequency for the lexical expressions for factory in Kurdish varieties
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Table 12 Frequency for the lexical expressions for mother in Kurdish varieties
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Abbreviations

CK:

Central Kurdish

KDP:

Kurdistan Democratic Party

MDKD:

Manchester Database of Kurdish Dialects

NK:

Northern Kurdish

PUK:

Patriotic Union of Kurdistan

SEK:

Southeastern Kurmanji

SK:

Southern Kurdish

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Sheyholislami, J., Surkhi, R. (2022). Lexical Variation and Semantic Change in Kurdish. In: Matras, Y., Haig, G., Öpengin, E. (eds) Structural and Typological Variation in the Dialects of Kurdish. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-78837-7_2

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-78837-7_2

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