Uzbek language

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{{language |name=Uzbek |nativename=O'zbek, Ўзбек, أۇزبېك |states=Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, Afghanistan, Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan, Tajikistan, Russia, China, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, USA |speakers=18.5 million |rank=54 |familycolor=Altaic |fam1=Altaic (disputed) |fam2=Turkic |fam3=Eastern Turkic |nation=Uzbekistan |iso1=uz|iso2=uzb |lc1=uzb|ld1=Uzbek (generic)|ll1=none |lc2=uzn|ld2=Northern Uzbek|ll2=Northern Uzbek language |lc3=uzs|ld3=Southern Uzbek|ll3=Southern Uzbek Language}}

Uzbek (O'zbek tili in Latin script, Ўзбек тили in Cyrillic script) is an Eastern Turkic language and the official language of Uzbekistan. It has about 18.5 million native speakers, and it is spoken by the Uzbeks in Uzbekistan and elsewhere in Central Asia. The ancient Uzbek language was spoken in Sogdiana, Bactria, and Chorasmia. The lexicon and grammar of Uzbek is most closely linked to the Uighur language, while other influences rose from Persian, Arabic and Russian.

1 Number of speakers
2 Loan words
3 Dialects
4 Writing systems
5 Text sample
6 References
7 See also
8 External links

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Number of speakers

In the CIS countries, there are about 16.7 million people who speak dialects of Uzbek. In Uzbekistan, 14 million people speak Uzbek as their native language. There are about 1.2 million speakers in Tajikistan, 550,096 in Kyrgyzstan, 332,017 in Kazakhstan, and 317,333 in Turkmenistan. According to the 1990 census, about 3,000 people in Xinjiang (China) speak Uzbek.

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Loan words

The influence of Islam, and by extension, Arabic, is evident in Uzbek, as well as the residual influence of Russian, from the time when Uzbekistan was under czarist and Soviet domination. Most of the Arabic words have found their way into Uzbek through Persian.

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Dialects

The Uzbek language has many dialects, varying widely from region to region. However, there is a commonly understood dialect which is used in mass media and in most printed material. Some linguists consider the language spoken in northern Afghanistan by ethnic Uzbeks to be a dialect of Uzbek.

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Writing systems

In the Soviet Union and until 1992, Ozbek was written using the Cyrillic alphabet, but now the Latin script is used. In China, Uzbek speakers write it using a modified Persian-Arabic alphabet.

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Text sample

Latin	Cyrillic	English
Barcha odamlar erkin, qadr-qimmat va huquqlarda teng bo'lib tug'iladilar. Ular aql va vijdon sohibidirlar va bir-birlari ila birodarlarcha muomala qilishlari zarur.	Барча одамлар эркин, қадр-қиммат ва ҳуқуқларда тенг бўлиб туғиладилар. Улар ақл ва виждон соҳибидирлар ва бир-бирлари ила биродарларча муомала қилишлари зарур.	All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.

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References

E. Allworth: Uzbek Literary Politics (The Hague, Mouton 1964).
András J. E. Bodrogligeti: Modern Literary Uzbek. A Manual for Intensive Elementary, Intermediate, and Advanced Courses (Munich, Lincom 2002), 2 vols.
William Fierman: Language planning and national development. The Uzbek experience (Berlin etc., de Gruyter 1991).
Khayrulla Ismatulla: Modern literary Uzbek (Bloomington, Indiana University Press 1995).
Karl A. Krippes: Uzbek-English dictionary (Kensington, Dunwoody 1996).
Andrée F. Sjoberg: Uzbek Structural Grammar (The Hague, 1963).
Natalie Waterson (ed.): Uzbek–English dictionary (Oxford etc., Oxford University Press 1980).