Afghans or Afghan people are nationals or citizens of Afghanistan, or people with ancestry from there. Afghanistan is made up of various ethnicities, of which Pashtuns, Tajiks, Hazaras and Uzbeks are the largest. The three main languages spoken by Afghans are Dari, Pashto and Uzbek many Afghans are bilingual speaking both Dari and Pashto.
Pakistan had a population of 241,492,197 according to the final results of the 2023 Census. This figure includes Pakistan's four provinces e.g. Punjab, Sindh, KPK, Balochistan and Islamabad Capital Territory. AJK and Gilgit-Baltistan's census data is yet to be approved by CCI Council of Pakistan. Pakistan is the world's fifth most populous country.
Tajiks are a Persian-speaking Iranian ethnic group native to Central Asia, living primarily in Afghanistan, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan. Tajiks are the largest ethnicity in Tajikistan, and the second-largest in Afghanistan and Uzbekistan. They speak varieties of Persian, a Western Iranian language. In Tajikistan, since the 1939 Soviet census, its small Pamiri and Yaghnobi ethnic groups are included as Tajiks. In China, the term is used to refer to its Pamiri ethnic groups, the Tajiks of Xinjiang, who speak the Eastern Iranian Pamiri languages. In Afghanistan, the Pamiris are counted as a separate ethnic group.
Dari, also known as Dari Persian, is the variety of the Persian language spoken in Afghanistan. Dari is the term officially recognised and promoted since 1964 by the Afghan government for the Persian language; it is known as Afghan Persian or Eastern Persian in many Western sources. The decision behind renaming the local variety of Persian was more political than linguistic to support an Afghan state narrative. Apart from a few basics of vocabulary, there is little difference between formal written Persian of Afghanistan and Iran; the languages are mutually intelligible. Dari is the official language for 35 million Afghans in Afghanistan and it serves as the lingua franca for interethnic communications in Afghanistan.
Pashtunistan is a region located on the Iranian Plateau, inhabited by the indigenous Pashtun people of southern Afghanistan and northwestern Pakistan, wherein Pashtun culture, the Pashto language, and Pashtun identity have been based. Alternative names historically used for the region include Pashtūnkhwā (پښتونخوا), Pakhtūnistān, Pathānistān, or simply the Pashtun Belt.
The population of Afghanistan is around 41 million as of 2023. The nation is composed of a multi-ethnic and multilingual society, reflecting its location astride historic trade and invasion routes between Central Asia, South Asia, and Western Asia. Ethnic groups in the country include Pashtun, Tajik, Hazara, Uzbek, as well as smaller groups such as Nuristani, Aimaq, Turkmen, Baloch, and some others which are less known. Together they make up the contemporary Afghan people.
Pashto is an Eastern Iranian language in the Indo-European language family, natively spoken in northwestern Pakistan, southern and eastern Afghanistan, and some isolated pockets of far eastern Iran near the Afghan border. It has official status in Afghanistan and the Pakistani province of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. It is known in historical Persian literature as Afghani.
Pakistan is a multilingual country with over 70 languages spoken as first languages. The majority of Pakistan's languages belong to the Indo-Iranian group of the Indo-European language family.
The culture of Afghanistan has persisted for over three millennia, tracing record to at least the time of the Achaemenid Empire in 500 BCE, and encompasses the cultural diversity of the nation. Afghanistan's culture is historically strongly connected to nearby Persia, including the same religion, as the people of both countries have lived together for thousands of years. Its location at the crossroads of Central, South and Western Asia historically made it a hub of diversity, dubbed by one historian as the "roundabout of the ancient world".
Fārsīwān is a contemporary designation for Persian speakers in Afghanistan and its diaspora elsewhere. More specifically, it was originally used to refer to a distinct group of farmers in Afghanistan and urban dwellers. In Afghanistan, original Farsiwans are found predominantly in Herat and Farah provinces. They are roughly the same as the Persians of eastern Iran. The term excludes the Hazāra and Aymāq tribes, who also speak dialects of Persian.
New Persian, also known as Modern Persian is the current stage of the Persian language spoken since the 8th to 9th centuries until now in Greater Iran and surroundings. It is conventionally divided into three stages: Early New Persian, Classical Persian, and Contemporary Persian.
Afghanistan is a multiethnic and mostly tribal society. The population of the country consists of numerous ethnolinguistic groups: mainly the Pashtun, Tajik, Hazara, and Uzbek, as well as the minorities of Aimaq, Turkmen, Baloch, Pashai, Nuristani, Gujjar, Brahui, Qizilbash, Pamiri, Kyrgyz, Sadat, and others. Altogether they make up the Afghan people.
Standard Persian is the standard variety of Persian that is the official language of the Iran and Tajikistan and one of the two official languages of Afghanistan. It is a set of spoken and written formal varieties used by the educated persophones of several nations around the world.
Pashtunization, is a process of cultural or linguistic change in which someone or something non-Pashtun becomes acculturated to Pashtun influence. Pashtuns are the largest ethnic group in Afghanistan and second-largest in Pakistan.
South Asia is home to several hundred languages, spanning the countries of Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka. It is home to the third most spoken language in the world, Hindi–Urdu; and the sixth most spoken language, Bengali. The languages in the region mostly comprise Indo-Iranic and Dravidian languages, and further members of other language families like Austroasiatic, and Tibeto-Burman languages.
Pakistan is an ethnically and linguistically diverse country. The major Pakistani ethnolinguistic groups include Punjabis, Pashtuns, Sindhis, Gujjar, Saraikis, Muhajirs, Balochs, Paharis and Brahuis, with significant numbers of Baltis, Kashmiris, Chitralis, Shina, Kohistanis, Torwalis, Hazaras, Burusho, Wakhis, Kalash, Siddis, Uzbeks, Nuristanis, Pamiris, Hindkowans, Kyrgyz, Turkmen, Uyghurs and other various minorities.
Across Afghanistan, proverbs are a valued part of speaking, both publicly and in conversations. Afghans "use proverbs in their daily conversations far more than Westerners do, and with greater effect". The most extensive proverb collections in Afghan languages are in Pashto and Dari, the two official languages in Afghanistan.
Many countries and national censuses currently enumerate or have previously enumerated their populations by languages, native language, home language, level of knowing language or a combination of these characteristics.
Afghan literature or literature of Afghanistan refers to the literature produced in the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan. Influenced by Central and South Asian literature, it is predominantly written in two native and official languages of Afghanistan, Dari and Pashto. Some regional languages such as Uzbek, Turkmen, Balochi, and Pashayi also appears in Afghan literature. While Afghanistan is a multilingual country, these languages are generally used as oral compositions and written texts by the Afghan writers and in Afghan curriculum. Its literature is highly influenced by Persian and Arabic literature in addition to Central and South Asia.
