Semester-long Upper Intermediate/Advanced Persian (ONLINE)

October 4–December 23, 2021

Days: TBD, 3 days per week

Time: 2.5 per day

Duration: 12 weeks 

Total hours of instruction: 90

Course fee: $1670

Deadlines: September 27, 2021 (application, extended deadline) and October 3, 2021 (payment)

This program is an online version of the course we have planned for Fall 2021. Due to the precarious public health situation caused by COVID-19 we have decided to temporarily move our courses online. Please check our website for updates regarding semester-long courses planned for Spring 2022.

Course

This intensive course is designed for upper-intermediate and advanced learners of Persian who would like to make fast progress over one semester.  The course is structured  around  exerpts from modern literature, which will serve as  examples of grammar in use and  writing styles. The choice of the excerpts will be made based on enrolled students’ interests but is likely to include modern classics like Mohammad-Ali Jamalzadeh, Ebrahim Golestan, Bozorg Alavi, Mahmoud Dowlatabadi, Sadegh Hedayat, Zoya Pirzad, Simin Daneshvar, Ali Mohammad Afghani, Abbas Maroufi and others. A limited selection of verse and prose in Classical Persian may also be included in the curriculum. Students interested in working on particular historical genres may get additional individual help with their readings outside of class time. A typical day of instruction will include  one hour devoted to reading, one hour devoted to grammar review and composition, and thirty minutes devoted to aural comprehension/conversational practice. The aural comprehension/conversation practice will involve recorded interviews and films related to the topics raised in the literature excerpt read that day.  These exercises will introduce students to different registers of live speech and help them learn to understand idiomatic expressions, slang, and regional dialects. By the end of the course, students should expect to be able to perceive and appreciate linguistic subtleties and humor and know how to adjust their own use of language in accordance with different social situations. The course will also place a special emphasis on vocabulary, and course participants can expect to have mastered 1000-1500 words. 

Place

ONLINE

[Why study Persian in Armenia? Historically, Armenia has been at the crossroads of different cultures and languages, and for centuries it was a part of the Persian-speaking world. Today, Armenia retains close ties with Iran, and Yerevan is a popular destination for students and tourists from Iran. One frequently hears Persian spoken on the streets of Yerevan, and our course participants will have plentiful opportunities to practice Persian outside of class. 

Mejlis Institute is located in one of the last surviving old neighborhoods of central Yerevan in a reconstructed old house amidst a lush fruit garden with beautiful views of the city. While remaining close to the busy city center, here students can immerse themselves in the idyllic atmosphere of old Yerevan. As long as weather conditions permit it, film screenings and other social events will take place in the open air in the garden. ]

Application and Fees

The deadline to apply is September 25, 2021. Applications will be reviewed on a rolling basis until the course capacity is filled, and we encourage students to apply as early as possible. 

The course fees are to be paid as a donation made through a bank transfer by October 3, 2021 (the payment can be made in two installments).

Instructor

Maryam Torabi, MA, is a scholar of Medieval Armenian and Persian literary traditions. Having studied Armenian and Persian literature in Isfahan Ms. Torabi came to Armenia to work on her doctoral dissertation, which she is currently completing in the Department of Linguistics at Yerevan State University. She focuses on the language of the eighteenth-century poet Sayat-Nova exploring his engagement with Persian poetry. Apart from teaching Armenian to Iranians and Persian to Armenians she has formerly served as the librarian of the Blue Mosque in Yerevan. 

Financial policy

Mejlis Institute is a non-profit organization. The funds collected will be used to pay the salary of the instructor, and any surplus will be invested in the development of our future programs. A portion of the proceeds will be used to support a local charity in Armenia. A report on the usage of the funds collected through the course will be presented to course participants upon request. The applicants who wish to attend the course but cannot afford to pay the course fees can be issued a partial or full fee waiver. To request a waiver, please send us an e-mail separately after filling the application form and arrange for a reference letter to be sent from your academic supervisor or another mentor who can attest to your merit and the situation of financial need. Since students’ donations constitute our main source of funding, we encourage applicants to consider applying for scholarships offered by their universities or seek other forms of external funding prior to applying for tuition waivers.

How do we calculate our course fees? Why are our courses cheaper than some but more expensive than other language programs? Read more about our financial policy to find out.