The Neo-Aramaic dialects are vernacular varieties of the Aramaic language spoken among small communities in Syria and Iraq as well as Turkey, Iran, Lebanon, and the Assyrian diaspora. These dialects represent the last remnants of the Northwest Semitic branch of Semitic languages which can trace their lineage back more than 3000 years of uninterrupted continuity (as Modern Hebrew is a revived language). This page collects media and bibliographic resources dedicated to the Neo-Aramaic dialects.
NENA Database Project
The North-Eastern Neo-Aramaic Database Project (https://nena.ames.cam.ac.uk/) hosted by Cambridge University gives access to recordings, transcribed texts and grammatical descriptions of the various NENA dialects. Most of these are now highly endangered and some of them have recently become extinct. Accessible here.
Geoffrey Khan: YouTube Videos
-Nov. 2023: Nabu Circle Lecture Series featuring Khan (available here)
-May 2022: “The Modern Assyrian Aramaic Documents and the urgent need to document them,” presented in Nineveh Academic Chair Congress of the University of Salamanca (available here)
-Mar. 2021: Carmen Moran of ANB SAT interviews Khan (available here)
-Mar. 2021: Rebecca Simon of Shamiram Media interviews Khan (available here)
-Feb. 2021: Rebecca Simon of Shamiram Media interviews Khan (available here)
-Jan. 2021: Weam Namou of the Chaldean Cultural Center interviews Khan (available here)
-April 2020: “The Aramaic-Speaking Jews of Iraq,” presented at the Jews of Iraq Conference (available here)
-Aug. 2017: “Introduction to the North-Eastern Neo-Aramaic Dialects Lecture 1: Introduction and Phonology” (available here); “Introduction to the North-Eastern Neo-Aramaic Dialects Lecture 2: Morphology” (available here); “Introduction to the North-Eastern Neo-Aramaic Dialects Lecture 3: Syntax” (available here)
-Feb. 2016: “Aramaic dialects of the Assyrian Christians and Assyrian Jews of Iraq and Iran” (available here)
-Sep. 2014: Khan in San Jose (available here)
-June 2012: “The Language of the Modern Assyrians and Its Historical Background” (available here)
Bibliography
-Khan, Geoffrey, and Lidia Napiorkowska, eds. Neo-Aramaic and Its Linguistic Context. Gorgias Neo-Aramaic Studies 14. Piscataway, NJ: Gorgias Press, 2015.
-Khan, Geoffrey, ed. Neo-Aramaic Dialect Studies: Proceedings of a Workshop on Neo-Aramaic held in Cambridge 2005. Gorgias Neo-Aramaic Studies 1. Piscataway, NJ: Gorgias Press, 2008.
-Other bibliographic resources forthcoming.