Diversity in convergence: Kurdish and Aramaic variation entangled

Cihêrengî di konverjansê de: Lêk-aliyana cudatiyên navxweyî yên kurdî û ara-miyê

Paul M. Noorlander
Additional contact information
Paul M. Noorlander: Leiden University Centre for Linguistics, the Netherlands

Kurdish Studies, 2014, vol. 2, issue 2, 201-224

Abstract: This article is about diverse types of convergence as well a few examples of how diversity within Kurdish affects the modern Aramaic dialectal landscape in Kurdistan. Kurdish-Aramaic bilingualism has had a major impact on Eastern Neo-Aramaic languages. There are numerous challenges to a comprehensive study of contact between the two speech communities, whose far-reaching history is intriguing yet highly complicated. In so doing, the functional-communicative approach mainly developed by Yaron Matras will be helpful, which presupposes that bilingual discourse is the primary locus of contact-induced change. Different factors play a role: those that facilitate, that constrain and that motivate the borrowing. This approach makes a valuable distinction between the borrowing of linguistic matter (concrete word-forms and parts) and the borrowing of linguistic patterns (constructions and their usage). It will be observed that the Jewish Aramaic dialects to the east of the Greater Zab River in the sphere of Central Kurdish influence are less resistant to incorporating Kurdish material, whereas those to the west of it tend to adapt to patterns of Northern Kurdish while making use of native Aramaic material.

Keywords: Aramaic; bilingualism; borrowing; convergence; dialectology; language area; language contact; language diversity; language maintenance (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2014
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
https://kurdishstudies.net/journal/index.php/ks/article/view/401/394 (application/pdf)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:mig:ksjrnl:v:2:y:2014:i:2:p:201-224

Access Statistics for this article

Kurdish Studies is currently edited by Cruz García Lirios

More articles in Kurdish Studies from Society of history and cultural studies, Hong Kong
Bibliographic data for series maintained by KSJ ().