Hello fellow wikipedia users,
I want to propose the creation of a wikipedia for the Uzbek language (uzb) variant which
uses the Perso-Arabic writing system, called „Arab Yazuv“ („Arab writing system“). This
variant is also known as Southern Uzbek (uzb) or Afghan Uzbek.
Although there is an Uzbek wikipedia (
uz.wikipedia.org), it does not include this type of
writing system and therefore it cannot be understood by a large group of Uzbek speakers
who use this writing system. This group of speakers consists of 3.4 million people in
Afghanistan alone, where the Perso-Arabic writing system is the sole and only used writing
system for the Uzbek language. There are also a sizable group of Uzbeks living in Saudi
Arabia, Pakistan and China who still use the Arab variant for writing their language.
Historically the Perso-Arabic writing system was the only writing system used for the
Uzbek language before beeing replaced in Uzbekistan by latin and cyrillic writing systems
in the 20th century.
The amount of literature for the Uzbek language written in the Perso-Arabic writing system
is considerably high due to the developmemt of Uzbek from Chaghatai (chg), which is very
closely resembled to the Perso-Arabic written Uzbek language of today.
The amount of modern Uzbek literature in this writing system increased in recent years due
to educational improvements in Northern Afghanistan. The interest in a Wikipedia for
Uzbek Speakers using the Perso-Arabic writing system is also considerably high and will
probably increase even more after its creation.
The language is sufficiently unique because it shares more words with Persian and Arabic
than the language variant used in Uzbekistan. It is even differentiated from the „uzb“
language code of Uzbekistan and uses its own „uzs“ language code. The language can not
coexist on the general latin based Uzbek wikipedia which consists of the latin and
cyrillic written variant of the language, because those two variants share a much stronger
etymological and liguistic development and are often understood by both, cyrillic and
latin writers of the Uzbek language, whereas the Perso-Arabic variant is almost
exclusively understood by the Afghan Uzbeks. Most modern computer like Mac and Windows
desktops include Afghan Uzbek Keyboards.
I want to thank anybody who can help in this case.
Abu Asem