Khowar / Chitrali [کھوار]

[Limagne]

There was no topic for this interesting Indo-Aryan language.

Khowar is spoken natively in the North-West of Pakistan. It has a relatively low number of native speakers (estimatedly less than one million) given the size of the country. According to various internet sources, it is mostly in use in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and the Gilgit-Baltistan provinces.

It is classified as a Dardic language, like Pashai and Kashmiri (among others).

Efforts appear to have been made in order to write and standardize the language as there is a daily bilingual Khowar / Urdu newspaper called Chitral Vision. A Khowar Academy was also created more than a decade ago.

Khowar is said to have been heavily influenced by the neighbouring Iranian languages, most notably Dari and Pashto.

Ressources:

The only widely available systematic approach to the grammar and lexicon of the language is in French. It is a great book, but with only 176 pages it can't be considered exhaustive.

Parlons Khowar, langue et culture de l'ancien royaume de Chitral au Pakistan - Erik L'homme.
ISBN 2738475639

Other than that, there's also a fairly big Khowar - English dictionary.

http://www.amazon.com/Khowar-English-Di ... rds=khowar

Here's also an online Khowar lexicon.

Not to forget that online Khowar dictionary

Brief description of the Khowar language:
http://www.anusha.com/khowar.htm

Spoken Khowar sample:
http://globalrecordings.net/en/language/3562

Khowar songs

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uO1PX0x3dXc

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EEdpVODh81M

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jv6qOhrbgbw

[Meera]

i have heard of Khowar but I never studdied or looked up any information on it but it is a very beautiful language.

[Limagne]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DZ67wE-z4cg&

[Meera]

Should this be moved to the South Asian forum?

[Limagne]

In theory yes.

Here's the website of the Khowar Academy:

https://sites.google.com/site/khowaracademy/

Omniglot also have a lot of links for Khowar:

http://www.omniglot.com/writing/khowar.htm

And then, a few Pakistani TV channels occasionally broadcast in Khowar:

http://kay2.tv/index.php
http://www.khybernews.tv/

[eskandar]

A Khowar dictionary with audio.