Farsi · Pronunciation Guide

How do you pronounce "عاشق بودن" in Farsi?

Q: How do you pronounce عاشق بودن in Farsi?

عاشق بودن is pronounced with the stress described below. In IPA it is written /ɒːˈʃeɣ ˈbuːdæn/. It means “to love.” Say 'ah-SHEQ BOO-dahn' — the 'q' is that raspy, back-of-throat 'gh' sound, not an English 'k'. Āsheq means 'in love/enamored', budan is 'to be', so 'to be in love [with]'.

Say 'ah-SHEQ BOO-dahn' — the 'q' is that raspy, back-of-throat 'gh' sound, not an English 'k'. Āsheq means 'in love/enamored', budan is 'to be', so 'to be in love [with]'.

عاشق بودن /ɒːˈʃeɣ ˈbuːdæn/

āsheq budan

Āsheq stresses its final syllable ('-sheq'); budan keeps its own stress on 'bu' — ā-SHEQ BU-dan. The initial ع is a glottal stop that Iranian speakers barely articulate word-initially, so don't force a hard consonant there.

Listen: عاشق بودن

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Sound it out

ع ا ع is technically a glottal catch (like the pause in 'uh-oh'), but word-initially Iranians usually don't articulate it distinctly — it just comes out as a plain long 'ā' like 'father'.

ش ق ش is 'sh' as in 'shoe'; ق is the merged Iranian 'gh' sound, buzzed at the very back of the throat — closer to a French/Parisian 'r' than to an English 'k' or hard 'g'.

ب و د ن 'budan' — bu rhymes with 'boo', dan rhymes with 'John'; stress on 'BU'.

Hear it in a sentence

او عاشق موسیقی است.

U āsheq-e musighi ast.

He/She loves music.

Listen: او عاشق موسیقی است.

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'او عاشق موسیقی است' (U āsheq-e musighi ast, 'He/She loves music') hides an ezafe: āsheq-e musighi links āsheq to its object with the unstressed '-e' vowel, literally 'in-love-of music'. This ezafe isn't written in the script but must be pronounced, and ast ('is') closes the sentence as the copula.

Where English speakers slip

The biggest trap is skipping the ezafe '-e' between āsheq and its object — learners often say 'āsheq musighi ast' with no linking vowel, which sounds broken; you must say 'āsheq-e musighi', gluing the two words together the way you'd never drop 'of' in 'fond of music'.