Broken Forms and Persian Dictionaries

By “broken form” we mean the written form of a colloquial Persian word, affix or clitic which firstly reflects the colloquial pronunciation of that form, and secondly has an equivalent formal form with different pronunciation in formal Persian. Here are some examples of Persian broken forms and their formal equivalent forms: اگه/اگر; می تونم/می توانم; رو/را. Broken forms were introduced firstly into Persian modern literary works such as novels and dramas especially to show the actual and colloquial dialogues of their characters. This paper deals with Persian broken forms in Persian dictionaries. We try to answer such frequently asked questions as follows: 1) Are we allowed to enter the broken forms into dictionaries as independent entries? If yes, then why? and 2) Which forms have to be entered in dictionaries? Based on a detailed corpus prepared from real Persian literary texts we conclude that there are just a few words that necessarily have to be entered into dictionaries. We also discussed about the way these items have to be entered into general Persian dictionaries. The present contribution aims to portray a descriptive analysis of “broken forms” in Persian, a Persian-specific category which should be described in its own terms. Therefore, the explanation being argued here seems to be superior to framework-bound analyses and is presented in a framework-free manner. It has been discussed and suggested that all broken forms used in Persian Novels and dramas must be included in Persian general dictionaries as independent entries. The independent entries may be  reduced ones, in the sense that the reader may be referred to the formal entry for all the related information including meaning, example, part of speech, and so on…), however  two points are strongly expected to be included in the reduced entry: 1. The stylistic label, and 2. The pronunciation. Generally-speaking, there are three types of broken forms: 1) Stylistic free forms; 2) Verbal Forms; and 3) Clitic Forms. It is proposed that the stylistic free forms are the most current broken forms which are produced by some more and less productive phonological rules. Based on our corpus they are as follows:آ/ آقا sir؛ آتیش/ آتش fire؛ آروم/ آرام rest؛ آق/ آقا sir؛ ابرام/ ابراهیم Abraham (proper noun)؛ اروا/ ارواح ghost؛ امبر/ انبر clamp؛ الان/ الآن now؛ اوس/ استاد master؛ اوسا/ استاد master؛ اوسا/ استاد master؛ بادام/ بادوم almond؛ بام/ بوم roof؛ باهار/ بهار spring؛ البت/ البته of course؛ برا/ برای for؛ پمبه/ پنبه cotton؛ پوس/ پوست skin؛ په/ پس then؛ پیرن/ پیراهن shirt؛ تموم/ تمام all؛ تو/ توی in؛ تومن/ تومان tuman (Iranian Currency)؛تیکه/ تکه part؛ جاهاد/ جهاد sacred war؛ جمبه/ جنبه Friday؛ جیگر/ جگر liver…The verbal forms are divided into two types :a)verbal endings; such as بخوابه[1]/ بخوابد orبخوابین[2]/ بخوابید  or بخوابن[3]/ بخوابند…and b)stylistic alternations of present verb stems, such as بینم[4]/ ببینم; بدم[5]/ بدهم … and finally the clitic forms being just a few but highly frequent are clitic broken forms in Persian language which may be divided into four groups: a) Endings of the verb to be (بودن); b) forms of topic marker را; c) types of pronominal clitic; and d) adverbial clitic  هم/ م (also/ too). None of the four clitic forms can have an independent entry in dictionaries because they are not free morphemes, therefore they are briefly introduced in explanatory tables in dictionaries. Our analysis is based upon a corpus of 11200 broken forms (tokens) extracted randomly from the dialogues of 112 contemporary Persian published novels and dramas (1917-2017), i.e. 100 broken forms from each work. Looking up the extracted forms in some general Persian dictionaries, we noticed that nearly not a single broken form has been entered the dictionaries as an entry. The pertaining and significant   hindrances arise when foreigners learning Persian language need to find the meaning of these actual forms but cannot find them in any general Persian dictionary, however Persian lexicographers, editors and grammarians are biased to ignore such forms so that they usually don't take them into consideration. Notwithstanding such old and strong negative attitudes, Persian novelists and playwrights make use of the broken forms vastly and freely. We discussed and suggested here that all the broken forms used largely in Persian contemporary novels and dramas should be entered into general Persian dictionaries with a stylistic label such as 'COLLIQUIAL' or 'BROKEN' or so on. In this paper, based on our limited corpus discussed previously, we attempted to extract a list of Persian broken forms. “Broken forms” are written forms of a colloquial Persian words, affixes or clitics. A broken form, therefore, reflects the colloquial pronunciation of each form, and has an equivalent formal form with different pronunciation in formal Persian. Broken forms were introduced firstly into Persian modern literary works such as novels and dramas especially to show the actual and colloquial dialogues of their characters. It has been discussed in this paper that broken forms, especially those used vastly in Persian modern literature, must be recorded in Persian general dictionaries. Based on a detailed corpus extracted from real Persian literary texts we conclude that there are just a few words that necessarily have to be entered into dictionaries.

[1]. He sleeps

[2]. You sleep

[3]. They sleep

[4]. I see

[5]. I give