30.2003, Review: Dari; General Linguistics; Language Documentation; Sociolinguistics: Mitchell, Naser (2017)

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Subject: 30.2003, Review: Dari; General Linguistics; Language Documentation; Sociolinguistics: Mitchell, Naser (2017)

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Date: Fri, 10 May 2019 17:29:53
From: Troy Spier [tspier2 at gmail.com]
Subject: A Grammar of Dari

 
Discuss this message:
http://linguistlist.org/pubs/reviews/get-review.cfm?subid=36479777


Book announced at http://linguistlist.org/issues/28/28-5260.html

AUTHOR: Rebecca  Mitchell
AUTHOR: Djamal  Naser
TITLE: A Grammar of Dari
PUBLISHER: Lincom GmbH
YEAR: 2017

REVIEWER: Troy E Spier, Tulane University

SUMMARY

A Grammar of Dari presents to the reader a contemporaneous account of Afghan
Persian (hereafter Dari) as spoken in Kabul, Afghanistan. Contrary to previous
linguistic treatments of Dari, this grammar relies strictly upon linguistic
exemplars from the Afghan context, i.e. without making recourse to the
prestige dialect spoken in neighboring Iran. In pursuit of this task, this
textbook is divided into six chapters that correspond to the sociolinguistic
overview, phonology, morphology, syntax, the lexicon, and sample texts.
Nevertheless, the authors assume no background knowledge of the Dari language
and proceed accordingly.

The introductory chapter opens by establishing precisely why this descriptive
grammar is even necessary, viz. by arguing that previous linguistic treatments
of Dari have been overwhelmingly myopic in presenting linguistic data almost
solely in opposition to, or with reference to, Iranian Persian (hereafter
Farsi), the regionally more prestigious linguistic variety. Once this position
has been established, the chapter shifts to a discussion of frequently
(mis)used nomenclature and a general distribution of the three main varieties
of Persian, which the authors perhaps somewhat peculiarly refer to
collectively as “South-Western Iranian.” Hereafter, the reader is presented
with a brief overview of the geopolitical and historical background of
Afghanistan, beginning with the earliest inclusion of the nation into the
Achaemenid Empire almost three thousand years ago and concluding with a
discussion of the most recent decades of turmoil involving the Soviet Union,
the Taliban, and the United States. Finally, the chapter ends by defining the
current sociolinguistic status of Dari (in contrast to Farsi and Tajiki, for
instance), engaging the previous research specifically on Dari, and providing
a brief lesson on the primary orthography employed, i.e. the Perso-Arabic
script.

Chapter 2 presents an introduction to the phonemic inventory of Dari,
beginning with vocalic segments (eight monophthongs and five diphthongs). The
differences in articulation of the back vowels are attributed to geographical
differences, viz. that /ɑ/ becomes more rounded closer to the Tajik border,
while /o/ and /u/ become merged closer to the Iranian border. Next, the
twenty-four consonants contrastively used in Dari are presented according to
manner of articulation before the discussion turns to syllabification more
generally. The basic syllable structure consists of a vocalic nucleus that can
be preceded by a single consonant or followed by up to two consonants; in any
case, the syllable-timed nature of Dari results in predictable stress.

Chapter 3 is the longest section of the grammar and discusses in depth the
morphological system. The first half describes all non-verbal lexical
categories, including nouns, pronouns, adjectives, adverbs, prepositions,
numerals, and interjections; the second half focuses strictly on verbal
morphology, dedicating greater time to conjugations according to tense,
aspect, mood, and voice. Nevertheless, the true highlights of the first half
are found in the extensive descriptions of the numeral classifiers used for
marking plurals, the primary means of deriving adverbs from adjectives, the
spatiotemporal distinctions made between simple and complex prepositional
phrases, the manner in which mathematical operations and times of the year are
expressed numerically, and the discursive functions of interrogatives. The
second half, on the other hand, opens with a chart outlining the fifteen
possible forms of all regular, non-defective verbs. Then, a detailed
exemplification is undertaken of each of the six tenses (present, present
perfect, preterite, imperfect, pluperfect, and future), the eight aspectual
differences (progressive, non-progressive, perfective, imperfective,
resultative, durative, iterative, and punctual), the three moods (indicative,
subjunctive, imperative), and the two voices (active and passive). Finally,
the chapter concludes with an examination of the two modal verbs (بایستن and
شایستن) and the productivity of the most frequently used light verbs (کردن
,دادن ,شدن ,زدن ,داشتن, and کشیدن).

Chapter 4 presents a brief account of the syntactic structure and begins by
presenting the six cross-linguistic tendencies of languages with a basic
constituent ordering of SOV. The topic then shifts to specific aspects of
syntax in Dari, including topicalization, interrogative constructions,
subjunctive forms, subordinate clauses, coordination of clauses, and the use
of conjunctions.

Chapter 5 foregrounds the Indo-European roots of Dari but also describes the
presence and influence of loanwords in Dari from Arabic, Turkish, French,
English, etc. before turning to a discussion of derivation through prefixation
and suffixation.

Finally, Chapter 6 contains three transcribed, transliterated, glossed, and
translated texts in Dari and English. Although limited in length, this section
presents contextualized usage of the many morphosyntactic characteristics
described in the preceding chapters, specifically by providing three very
different texts alongside one another, viz. an international newspaper
article, a lesson on life as recited by Sheikh ibn Sina, and a ninth-century
love poem by Rabia Balkhi.

EVALUATION

The authors of A Grammar of Dari must be applauded for producing with such
clarity an account of Kabuli Persian, which has come to be recognized as the
standardized form of Dari. Moreover, it is remarkable that this linguistic
variety has been given an equal platform to both Farsi and Tajiki in this
series, thus reinforcing the authors’ position that each variety is different
enough to warrant separate descriptions. Additionally, while primarily
intended as a linguistic account of Dari, this grammar also introduces the
reader to the complex historical, sociocultural, and geopolitical context
surrounding Afghanistan and shares with the reader eight color images that,
although not directly related to the neighboring content, provide the reader
with a glimpse of life in Qunduz, Kabul, Mazar-e Sharif, and Qandahar.

Still, one of the most exciting aspects of this grammatical description also
coincides with the primary goal of the authors, i.e. to demonstrate the
independence of Dari by using language data specifically from Afghanistan. For
example, some regional varieties utilize word-final /n/ elision that results
in near-minimal pairs (as in the pronunciation of من  vs. ما), most saliently
among speakers of Hazaragi. On the other hand, there exists in the northern
provinces a dual participle progressive construction that requires the use of
a semantically functional verb, the past participle of ستادن (‘to stand’), and
the present tense of بودن (‘to be’). Such linguistic phenomena are at best
rarely discussed and at worst completely obscured by other studies that
privilege non-Afghan varieties of Persian.

Another benefit of this reference grammar, as demonstrated most directly in
the final chapter, is that every example word or sentence analyzed is given
initially in the Perso-Arabic script and subsequently transliterated into the
Latin script. This breaks with tradition, since many such grammars typically
employ only one of the two writing systems, not both. Nevertheless, in a text
intended for readers who are unfamiliar with the language, the constant
marking of vowel diacritics would mitigate the need for the Latin script
altogether—or simply make the transliteration more transparent.

The organization of the text is generally concise and straightforward;
however, there are a few areas where restructuring could result in greater
cohesion. For instance, the chapter on morphology is bifurcated into nominal
and verbal morphology, the former which seemingly subsumes lexical categories
that could otherwise have been allocated separate subsections, e.g
prepositions do not adhere to the same patterns or exhibit the same behavior
as nominals in Dari (or even cross-linguistically in many languages);
consequently, it feels somewhat odd to place them within the same section.
Furthermore, sentential negation seems similarly ill-suited to the chapter on
morphology and better located within the chapter on syntax. Still, although
exemplified with precision, lexical categories are not otherwise defined. As a
result, one must determine solely on the basis of the exemplars provided what
actually constitutes a particular lexical category as opposed to the specific
distributional criteria—whether syntactic and/or semantic (as in Wahab 2013
and Baker 2017)—that serve to characterize them. Finally, the penultimate
chapter on the lexicon might not be necessary as an independent chapter, viz.
if the etymological exploration is incorporated into the sociolinguistic
overview; the illustration of prefixation and suffixation, in the chapter on
morphology.

Lastly, although not explicitly intended as a learning resource, the
pedagogical limitations are readily apparent through the lack of exercises,
which one finds even in traditional reference grammars (see Yousef and Torabi
2013) but also in academic textbooks (see Khojayori 2009a, 2009b) and
resources used by philanthropic organizations (see Glassman 1971). Moreover,
the inclusion of additional texts and/or a dictionary of all lexical items
would greatly increase the pragmatic value of this text as more than a
reference for consultation.

REFERENCES

Baker, Adam. 2017. A Learner's Grammar of Dari.
https://www.iamafghanistan.org/lcp/downloads/dari-grammar.pdf

Glassman, Eugene H. 1971. Conversational Dari: An Introductory Course in Dari
as Spoken in Afghanistan. Kabul, Afghanistan: The Language & Orientation
Committee, International Afghan Mission.

Khojayori, Nasrullo. 2009a. Tajiki: An Elementary Textbook, Vol. 1.
Washington, D.C.: Georgetown University Press.

———. 2009b. Tajiki: An Elementary Textbook, Vol. 2. Washington, D.C.:
Georgetown University Press.

Olson, Randall B. 1994. A Basic Course in Tajik: Grammar and Workbook.
http://talktajiktoday.com/documents/ABasicCourseInTajik.pdf

Wahab, Shaista. 2013. Beginner’s Dari. (Hippocrene Beginner’s Series). New
York: Hippocrene Books.

Yousef, Saeed and Hayedeh Torabi. 2013. Basic Persian: A Grammar and Workbook
(Routledge Grammar Workbooks). New York: Routledge.


ABOUT THE REVIEWER

Troy E. Spier is Ph.D. Candidate in Linguistics at Tulane University in New
Orleans, Louisiana. He previously earned an MA in Linguistics at Tulane
University and a B.S. in Secondary English Education at Kutztown University.
He is interested primarily in language documentation and description,
specifically with a focus on Bantu languages. He has secondary research
interests in computational linguistics and in the construction, maintenance,
and loss of ethnolinguistic identity.





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