What language do the Kurdish speak?

Kurmanji is the language of the vast majority of Kurds in Turkey, Syria, Armenia, and Azerbaijan, and of a few in Iraq and Iran, with an estimated 15-17 million speakers in total. Sorani is the language of most Kurds in Iraq (4-6 million speakers) and Iran (5-6 million speakers).

How many languages can Kurds speak?

The three Kurdish languages are Northern Kurdish (Kurmanji), Central Kurdish (Sorani), and Southern Kurdish (Xwarîn). A separate group of non-Kurdish Northwestern Iranian languages, the Zaza–Gorani languages, are also spoken by several million ethnic Kurds. The majority of the Kurds speak Kurmanji.

What language is most like Kurdish?

Kurdish and Persian are linguistically sister languages and both are in the Iranian branch, much like how English and German can be considered sister languages of the Germanic branch. Since Persian is an Indo-European language, it is not linguistically related to Arabic.

Is Kurdish difficult to learn?

Learning Kurdish can be hard in terms of grammar and learning resources, especially if you don’t speak any middle-eastern language. The Kurmanji dialect can be easier for speakers of European languages because it uses the Latin alphabet, while the Surani dialect uses the Arabic script.

What race are the Kurds?

The Kurds are one of the indigenous peoples of the Mesopotamian plains and the highlands in what are now south-eastern Turkey, north-eastern Syria, northern Iraq, north-western Iran and south-western Armenia. Today, they form a distinctive community, united through race, culture and language, even though they have no standard dialect.

Where is Kurdish spoken?

Kurdish language. It is spoken within a broad region that stretches roughly from Orūmīyeh, Iran, to the lower reaches of traditional Kurdistan in Iraq. It is usually written in a modified Perso-Arabic script, though Latin script is increasingly used. Southern Kurdish, also called Pehlewani, consists of a number of less-studied dialects.

Is Kurdistan a country?

Kurdish (Kurdî) is the language of the Kurdish people who live in the region known as Kurdistan that is divided between four countries – Turkey, Iraq, Iran and Syria.