Code-Copying in the Balochi language of Sistan(مقاله علمی وزارت علوم)
حوزههای تخصصی:
The main West Iranian languages، i.e. Old Persian، Parthian، Middle Persian،
New Persian and – in some respects – Avestan، may be studied in a uniquely
continuous development stretching over close to 3 000 years. These languages
are not only the result of their genetic inter-relations but also of their cultural،
religious and political history. They may be labelled ‘high languages’
(‘Hochsprachen’)، in the sense that they are cultured and standardized and
used for a great number of purposes by people of various linguistic
backgrounds. This article presents an over-view of their development seen from
a specific perspective. The traditional Iranian walled-in garden، the pairi-daēzaof
the Avesta، is used as a metaphor for a high language in contrast to the free
vegetation of spontaneous human speech in social interaction. The latter is
here called ‘dialect’، a concept that includes both ‘geolect’ and ‘sociolect’. These
high language ‘gardens’ are thus viewed as a kind of cultural artefacts. Among
other things، this has implications for views on the dichotomy literacy/orality،
showing that writing is not language and that ‘orality’ belongs both to ‘high
language’ and ‘dialect’. It is furthermore argued that literacy and orality were
present in complementary distribution throughout the whole known history of
the Iranian cultural sphere.