Afghanistan Analysts Network – English

Posts tagged: Pashto

Pashto

Hamstrung by Translation: How to analyse Afghanistan in an Afghan language?

Borhan Osman •

The most efficient languages to write about Afghan politics and society ought to be the two main languages of the country, Dari and Pashto. No foreign language can capture the various concepts native to Afghanistan as intricately as native speakers’ own languages do, for example in the case of Pashtunwali customs. However, the local languages […]

Context and Culture Read more

One Thousand Dollars for Books per Year: Afghanistan’s undersupplied universities

Christine Roehrs •

Afghan university students still do not have proper textbooks. Their professors give them so-called ‘chapters’ – copies of excerpts from lecture notes or books that are often out-dated. Libraries on the other hand remain underfunded dumping grounds for donated books that mostly do not fit needs, curricula or lecture contents. Why is that still so, […]

Economy, Development, Environment Read more

Obituary: The master of modern Pashto ghazal passes away

Borhan Osman •

One of Afghanistan’s most important poets, Muhammad Seddiq Pasarly, has died, aged 85. Known popularly as the ‘Master of Pashto Ghazal’ (Pashto love poems), Pasarly also translated works by Indian poet and Nobel laureate Rabindranath Tagore and Persian poet and philosopher Omar Khayyam for Pashto readers. AAN’s Borhan Osman has written this obituary.   What is youth? It is […]

Context and Culture Read more

Guest Blog: Inequality in Equality: Linguistic Convergence between Dari and Pashto

Lutz Rzehak •

Language matters. The issue of how to ‘correctly’ name institutions is just one linguistic issue which has become highly politicised in post-Taleban Afghanistan. AAN guest blogger Lutz Rzehak(*) looks at these issues from the point of view of a linguist who speaks three of Afghanistan’s languages and has carried out research there for several decades. […]

Context and Culture Read more

‘Pashto Mashto? Nakhair, Chat Mat.’

AAN Team •

Dear readers of Pashto Mashto, As you may have noticed already, with the new year has come a new name for this series, although the content will go on as usual. Here is why. The inaugural blog of this series, back in January 2010, has proven prophetic when it said the series would not, ‘try […]

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Pashto Women’s Poetry – A Mirror of their Social Status?

Naheed Esar Malikzay •

“My love will gather us both together on the day of resurrection Brutes have placed stones between us in this world.” – On Friday, 16 September, the Mirman Baheer Association, a Pashtun women’s socio-cultural network, met in Kabul.* It was the third gathering of Pashto women poets by the Association and it brought together more […]

Rights and Freedoms Read more

If you want to learn Pashto…

AAN Team •

Sean Mann, a research intern at our partner organisation TLO, has put together an online bibliography to Pashto learning materials. It includes textbooks, dictionaries, multimedia, radio, university courses, etc. It is called ‘Pashto Language Resources’ and is hosted on Christian Bleuer’s ‘Afghanistan Analyst’ website – use this link. You can start with the following sentence: کاڼه […]

Context and Culture Read more

Talking Pashto (1): One-Liner of the Week

Thomas Ruttig •

Today, we start a little series with important Pashto expressions for field use. It is meant to complement the electronic translation computers handed out to the international forces which – reportedly – contain useful phrases like: “Lasuna porta!” (Hands up!), “Mulla Omar cheri dey?” (Where is Mulla Omar?) and “Hawayi maidan kum taraf dey?” (Which […]

Context and Culture Read more

Flash from the Past: Islamic Order à la Hekmatyar

Thomas Ruttig •

The following statement was broadcast by HIG’s radio Payyam-e Azadi (Message of Freedom) in Pashto on 9 December 1994. Statement of the Military Command of Hezb-e Islami Afghanistan and Sepah-e Nur [Hezb’s military forces]. To the attention of all shop and restaurant owners and the noble population of Chahrasyab [a district capital in the South […]

Context and Culture Read more

Pashto Mashto – what’s that? Read it!

Thomas Ruttig •

The following blog starts our new non- but not a-political blog category called Pashto Mashto. It will not deal with daily political affairs but with issues related to Afghan languages and, more generally, culture(s). Cultural issues in the broader sense are often only covered at the margins by media (including bloggers) but are, at the […]

Context and Culture Read more

Read PASHTO MASHTO!

Thomas Ruttig •

Blog-e newin-e Shabaka-ye Tahlilgaran-e Afghanistan be-khwaned! De AAN neway blog wu-lwalley! Read AAN’s new cultural-linguistic Pashto Mashto under blog here, find out what that means and learn more about Afghanistan’s ‘human terrain’. The new category of blogs deals with non-political issues, like language, culture etc. But not only with Pashto… Contributions and comments are most welcome. Xhe raghlast […]

Context and Culture Read more

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