Linguistic and Cultural Connections between Iran and Georgia and Their Role in Facilitating the Teaching of Persian and Georgian Languages

Abstract

The Language teaching has always been a fundamental and essential issue worldwide. Human beings are inherently social, and their growth and development are closely linked to language. Without language, human society would stagnate and ultimately face the risk of decline. Consequently, language education has always been particularly important, especially among neighboring peoples who have maintained close geographical, cultural, and historical ties.
The Persian and Georgian languages and cultures have interacted extensively for centuries, exerting significant mutual influence. As a result, teaching Persian to Georgians and teaching Georgian to Persian speakers have long been regarded as important endeavors. Recognizing this significance, scholars and educators in both societies began promoting language learning centuries ago. The linguistic and cultural exchanges that have developed over time now constitute a valuable foundation for facilitating language education between these two peoples.
Today, Iranians and Georgians continue to share numerous linguistic and cultural similarities. By drawing upon this shared heritage, the teaching and learning of Persian and Georgian can become more effective and accessible. Based on the premise that increased linguistic and cultural interaction facilitates language acquisition, this paper demonstrates that the thousands of shared lexical items between Persian and Georgian provide an exceptional resource for simplifying the teaching of both languages. It is noteworthy that some of these shared words are identical in both languages, while others exhibit only slight differences in pronunciation or, in some
cases, semantic variation. These lexical correspondences are classified into several categories, which are examined and analyzed throughout the paper.