Kurdish, Northern

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A language of Turkey

ISO 639-3
kmr
Alternate Names
Kermancî, Kirmancî, Kurdi, Kurdî, Kurmancî, Kurmanji
Population

15,000,000 in Turkey (McCarus 2009), decreasing. About 20% monolingual, especially in Hakkari and Shirnak provinces. Very provisional figures for Northern Kurdish speaker population. Population total all countries: 20,210,872.

Location

Adiyaman, Agri, Batman, Bingol, Bitlis, Diyarbakir (Amed), Hakkari (Colemerg), Kars, Mardin, Shirnak, Siirt, Shanliurfa, and Van; also Ganziantep, Elazig, Erzincan, Erzurum, Kahramanmarash, Kayseri, Malatya, Sivas, Tunceli (Dersim), and other provinces; central Turkey, Konya, Cankiri and Cihanbeyli; many in Istanbul, Adana, Ankara, Izmir. Also in Armenia, Australia, Austria, Azerbaijan, Bahrain, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, Finland, France, Georgia, Germany, Greece, Iran, Iraq, Italy, Jordan, Kazakhstan, Kuwait, Kyrgyzstan, Lebanon, Netherlands, Norway, Russian Federation, Sweden, Switzerland, Syria, Turkmenistan, United Kingdom, United States.

Language Maps
Language Status

3 (Wider communication).

Classification
Indo-European, Indo-Iranian, Iranian, Western, Northwestern, Kurdish
Dialects

Ashiti, Bayezidi, Boti (Botani), Hekari, Marashi, Mihemedî, Shemdinani, Shikakî, Silivî. Dialect differences but all use the same written form.

Language Use

Home, market, political situations. Many are adults above age 30. Positive attitudes. Most also use Turkish [tur].

Language Development
Literacy rate in L1: Overall about 83%, but not differentiated by L1 or L2 usage. While overall speakers are decreasing, literates are increasing. Many literary works from 16th and 17th centuries onward. Poetry. Magazines. Newspapers. New media. Radio programs. Films. TV. Videos. Dictionary. Grammar. Bible: 2008.
Language Resources
OLAC resources in and about Kurdish, Northern
Writing
Arabic script, used in Iran, Iraq, Syria, and Lebanon. Cyrillic script, used in Russia and Armenia. Latin script, developed in 1932, used in Turkey.
Other Comments

Muslim (Sunni), Muslim (Alevi), Yezidi.

Also spoken in:

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