ABSTRACT
Historians and scholars define Persians as those people who speak Persian (Farsi) as their native language. From the viewpoint of many Westerners and Middle Easterners alike, the terms “Persian” and “Iranian” are synonymous. Indeed, until the 1920s, Iran was referred to as Persia throughout the Muslim and Western world. However, this is quite misleading, as today only half of Iran’s citizens are actually ethnically Persian. The other half belong to one of a large number of ethnic groups: Azerbaijanis (roughly 25 percent), Gilakis and Mazandaranis (8 percent), Kurds (7 percent), Arabs (3 percent), Lur (2 percent), Baluch (2 percent), Turkmen (2 percent), and other small groups like Armenians and Jews. Outside of Iran, Persians also reside in Georgia, Turkey, Armenia, the Caucasus, Azerbaijan, Afghanistan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, and Pakistan.
