Research into Kurdish Idiom: My Initial Thoughts

8.1 What is it that you wish to research? – Please state this in the form of a research question as you begin

your essay.  How effective is the use of metaphorical language with its origins in traditional Kurdish village life

for effective communication among the urban youth who are speakers of Behdini Kurdish?

8.2 Why is this research important to you, or to others? – Tell us how your topic is connected to literature and

other research you have done. How do you expect this research to make a contribution to the wider body of

knowledge in your discipline?

-1. The Behdini dialect has been sparsely documented, so it is useful at that level to learners of Behdini.

It will also be a contribution to the debate about what makes 'good Kurdish'.  See below.

8.3 What motivates you to do this research? – If your research is practitioner based explain how that is

relevant to your study.  To preach the gospel aptly, and to take captive every thought. 

Whether or not this comes to be stated explicitly - and I would prefer to make my thesis acceptable as a secular linguistic study in its own right- my thinking springs from a conviction about how

the kingdom of God grows.  It does not grow through violence, neither does it grow

through Western money or clever strategy, but rather through speaking the word of God.  But the

gospel must be spoken with aptness, accuracy and flavour.  "Sweetness of speech increases

persuasiveness" Prov 16:21.     Kurdish believers are poorly equipped to use the weapon of the word

skilfully.  Their language has not been well developed.  Kurdish culture has for centuries been suppressed, because its language has been despised as unworthy of use in education and worship.  And yet, even within this

ideological straightjacket, the richness of the Kurdish language has been preserved within an oral

tradition.  Kurdish proverbs and idiom are honoured as almost sacred scripture.  

So, I propose four avenues that could be explored for research topics:

A) Kurdish Proverbs.  This seems to be the safe option.  There are a number of books of Kurdish

proverbs.  A first step would be to translate Omer Salihi's Gotinet Peshiyan or one particular author's work

Kurdish Wisdom.  The latter is a neighbour, fluent in English, retired and keen to help.  The research

question could be to test familiarity and comprehension, with different regions and age groups.  

B) A Comparative Study of English idiom.  When I listen to preachers who have an exceptional

command of colloquial English I am awed at how they keep you listening because they are constantly

painting pictures.  I long to be able to communicate with cogency statements like – to pull a couple out

at random -"how will your wealth help you when old age comes knocking?", or "this verse is the death

blow to Western individualism".  How will a new generation of Kurdish preachers be raised up who

can preach winsomely, holding people's attention in the same way that the revered story-tellers of old

used to? I could use a book of English idiom and document Kurdish equivalents.  For example, a wild

goose chase has a Kurdish equivalent: "khew jee choo u kew jee choo": 'missed my lie-in and missed

the partridge too!'  

C) An Analytical Collection of Behdini Idiom

I have been documenting a lot of colourful Kurdish language in this past year.  This is not in itself an

academic exercise, more the labour of love of one who is at heart a Kurdish folklorist.  But I am sure

there is ground-breaking work here somewhere.  For example, I have not seen anyone try to document

the huge amount of rhyming and alliterative language in Kurdish.  We have bits and bobs, they have jil

u mil.  We like things spick and span, they like things ser u ber.  Or take animal idiom: I wonder

whether I could beaver away at documenting and then testing this huge lexis.  If I were to ferret around

for long enough, or even just swan around the chaykhanes as a sort of 'idiom squirrel' there would be

enough animal metaphor and simile to keep you reading til the cows come home.  The analysis could

look at how effectively an older generation's idiom connects with the Facebook urban generation.

D) Public Speaking

A different approach would be to analyse a selection of speeches, perhaps from political congresses, 

festivals, mosques or TV chat shows. Here the aim would be exploring how far renowned Kurdish

public speakers are using their language metaphorically in order to connect with a society whose roots

are in mountain villages.  I would want a substantial reading list on sociolinguistics, and some

typologies of language development, perhaps from the English language example.  Britain's seafaring

heritage still provides us with a huge catalogue of colourful idiom, from the tide turning to marriages

on the rocks to nailing your colours to the mast, even though we forget the roots of many of the

phrases.  Landlocked Kurdistan no doubt has a whole range of idiom that endures from its nomadic,

pastoralist heritage.

Many Kurdish linguists have a reductionist typology of language development, which is centred

around a hostility to loan words.   In English, of course, a purist approach would not appreciate the way

in which foreign words have been adopted but infused with a different meaning,  the shift from French

demander (to ask) to the English 'to demand' being a famous example. Melvyn Bragg's The Adventure

of English has whetted my appetite for the study of language development.

I look forward to bringing to the research a background in Kurdish history, but to shift a gear into more

purely linguistic research.  I have a lot to learn in the field of linguistics, but I am happy to expand my

historian's mind with some new linguistics tools.  Because I love this people and see many of them

suffering terribly in the current crisis, I am all the more motivated to immerse myself in their thoughts. 

To top and tail this essay with a Christian worldview, I want to "take captive every thought to make it

obedient to Christ".  People think using words.  And it would be a privilege for me to devote some

years of my life to analysing their words.  Of the above topics that I have introduced, a study of animal

idiom would be my preferred choice.  This essay has been of necessity a hurried work, but I hope that

it demonstrates an alertness to the wealth of unexplored territory in the Kurdish language, and a

willingness to listen to supervisors' guidance on what would be most suitable.