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Southern Kurdish
کوردی باشووری
Native to	Iran, Iraq
Region	Kurdistan
Ethnicity	Kurds
Native speakers	4.25 million in Iran (2021) unknown number in Iraq
Language family	Indo-European Indo-Iranian Iranian Western Northwestern Kurdish Southern Kurdish
Dialects	Feylî Kelhurrî Lekî Xaneqînî Gerrûsî (Bîcarî) Kermanshahî Kolyai Sanjâbî Melikşayî Bayray Kordalî
Writing system	Kurdish alphabet (Perso-Arabic script)
Language codes
ISO 639-3	sdh
Glottolog	sout2640
Linguasphere	58-AAA-c
Geographic distribution of Kurdish dialects and other Iranian languages spoken by Kurds   Kurmanji (Northern Kurdish)   Sorani (Central Kurdish)   Zaza language   Southern Kurdish (Gorani is included)   mixed dialect areas

Southern Kurdish (Kurdish: کوردی باشووری, romanized: Kurdî Başûrî) is one of the dialects of the Kurdish language, spoken predominantly in northeastern Iraq and western Iran. The Southern Kurdish-speaking region spans from Khanaqin in Iraq to Dehloran southward and Asadabad eastward in Iran.

Name

'Southern Kurdish' is a linguistic term for a group of related dialects in Western Iran. Speakers are not familiar with the term and do not refer to the language as such. They generally identify the kind of Kurdish they speak as a local dialect (the Kurdish of a given village), or as a regional variety such as "Garūsi".

Variants

Southern Kurdish has many variants, linguist Fattah divides them into 35 varieties. These include:

• Bîcarî
  • The most septentrional variety of Southern Kurdish spoken in and around Bijar in Iran. Bîcarî is the only Southern Kurdish variety detached from the greater Southern Kurdish-speaking region.
• Qurweyî (Chahar Dawli Xarbi)
  • The Quwreyî variety is spoken around Ghorveh in Iran and is related to the variety spoken in Asadabad and other Kurdish-speaking areas in Hamadan Province.
• Kulyayî
  • The Kulyayî variety is spoken northeast of Kermanshah, principally in Sonqor County and surrounding counties. The variety also spans into the Kolyai Rural District in Hamadan Province.
• Bîlewerî
  • The principal Southern Kurdish variety in Poshtdarband Rural District in Kermanshah.
• Dînewerî
  • About 83 villages in Dinavar District speak the Dînewer variety. The differences between the Dînewerî and the Kulyayî varieties are anodine.
• Sehne / Lekî-Kirmaşanî
  • The Sehne variety, or Lekî-Kirmaşanî has many similar characteristics with Lekî and is spoken in Harsin County and in Sahneh. What distinguishes it most from Lekî is the lack of the ergative case.
• Kurdelî a.k.a. Pahlavi is quite distant, and may be a distinct language.

Other variants include: Bîstûnî, Çihrî, Hersîn, Payrawend, Kirmaşanî, Sencabî, Xalesa, Çemçemal, Qesri Şîrînî, Serpuli Zehawî, Harasam, Kelhurrî, Îwan, Erkewazî, Şêrwanî, Îlamî, Salihabadî, Rîka, Bedreyî, Melikşahî, Mêxasî, Mihran, Xaneqînî, Mendilî, Duşêxî, Kaprat, Warmizyar, Zurbatiya and Feylî.

Alphabet

The Southern Kurdish alphabet is very similar to the Central Kurdish (Sorani) alphabet, which is a derivation of the Arabic alphabet. Southern Kurdish has one additional letter "ۊ"; the Arabic letter waw with two dots above.

See also

• Kalhor
• Khulam Rada Khan Arkawazi
• Sanjâbi
• Zangana

References

1. Southern Kurdish at Ethnologue (27th ed., 2024)
2. "Southern Kurdish". Ethnologue. Retrieved 8 April 2023.
3. "Kurdish language i. History of the Kurdish language". Iranica Online. Retrieved 25 June 2019.
4. Fattah (2000), pp. VII.
5. Anonby, Erik; Mohammadirad, Masour; Sheyholislami, Jaffer (299). "Kordestan Province in the Atlas of the Languages of Iran: Research process, language distribution, and language classification". Current issues in Kurdish linguistics. University of Bamberg Press. p. 26.
6. Fattah (2000), pp. 16–17.
7. Fattah (2000), pp. 18–19.
8. Fattah (2000), p. 19.
9. Fattah (2000), p. 20.
10. ^ Fattah (2000), p. 21.
11. Erik Anonby, Mortaza Taheri-Ardali & Amos Hayes (2019) The Atlas of the Languages of Iran (ALI). Iranian Studies 52. A Working Classification
12. Fattah (2000), pp. 22–40.

Bibliography

• Fattah, Ismaïl Kamandâr (2000), Les dialectes Kurdes méridionaux, Acta Iranica, ISBN 9042909188

Further reading

• Borjian, Habib (2024). "Kermāšāni: The Kurdish Dialect of Kermanshah". WORD. 70 (3): 199–240. doi:10.1080/00437956.2024.2381338.

External links

• Kurdish Academy of Language describing Southern Kurdish
• Audio recordings of wordlists and narratives in Southern Kurdish, archived with Kaipuleohone
• southern Kurdish Misplaced Pages

v t e Languages of Iraq
Official languages	Standard Arabic Mesopotamian Arabic (Main) Kurdish Sorani (Main) Kurmanji
Official minority languages	Neo-Aramaic Assyrian Neo-Aramaic Armenian Turkish Iraqi Turkmen/Turkoman dialects
Other minority languages	Gorani (Hawrami) Southern Kurdish (Xwarin) Persian Mandaic Neo-Mandaic Domari Hebrew Shabaki
Sign languages	Iraqi Sign Language Kurdish Sign Language

• Kurdish language
• Languages of Kurdistan