An Episode in the Genesis of the Persian Language

Abstract: Why did New Persian, the earliest form of modern Persian, first appear in Central Asia, far beyond the old geographical domain of earlier Persian language use? What made it different from the older stage of Middle Persian? This presentation explains the genesis of New Persian as the product of demographic conditions in the wake of the Arabic-Islamic conquests and subsequent patterns of Arab colonization. It offers a new history of the origins of modern Persian by correcting the philological analysis of some long-known primary sources and applying theoretical models from contact linguistics.

 

Kevin T. van Bladel is a philologist and historian studying texts and societies of the Near East of the period 200-1200 with special attention to the history of scholarship, the transition from Persian to Arab rule, and historical sociolinguistics. His research focuses on the interaction of different language communities and the translation of learned traditions between Arabic, Iranian languages, Aramaic, Greek, and Sanskrit. From 2013 to 2017 he was Associate Professor and department chair of Near Eastern Languages and Cultures at The Ohio State University.