Welcome to my home page for learning Pashto! This page is a basic introduction to the Pashto language and why you might want to consider learning it.
Pashto is part of the Iranian division of the Indo-Iranian group of the Indo-European language family. It has roughly 45 to 55 million speakers, most of whom live in Pakistan and Afghanistan. The ethnic Pashtuns, who also make up the largest ethnic group in Afghanistan, claim Pashto as their native language.
If you ever decide to travel to Afghanistan or Pakistan, having Pashto in your toolkit will prove to be very useful. It is the first language of approximately 40% to 55% of Afghanistan’s population, and it is the second language of approxmiately 10% to 28% of Afghanistan's population. Roughly 15% of Pakistan's population speaks Pashto.
Due to the lack of widespread media, literature, and awareness of Pashto, it might seem like Pashto does not have very many speakers. However, interestingly, the number of Pashto speakers is roughly double the number of Dutch speakers, and Dutch is certainly a respectible language! The point is that Pashto has plenty of speakers. One of the main contributers to Pashto's lack of influence on today's media is the fact that a sizeable portion of Pashto's speakers are illiterate or have limited literacy. While more and more efforts are being made to increase access to educational opportunities to learn Pashto (especially in Afghanistan and Pakistan), there are still many Pashto speakers who are not able to read or write Pashto. As a native speaker of Pashto who has learned how to read, write, and speak Pashto, I thought that I should make this website so that others, whether native speakers or not, can learn Pashto to the greatest extent possible.