What is Your Nationality?

Learn how to ask about someone's nationality

Also Appears In: Learn Persian in Three Minutes Throwback Thursday Can Introduce Yourself Level 1.1 Can Do Persian

Lesson Notes

Unlock In-Depth Explanations & Exclusive Takeaways with Printable Lesson Notes

Unlock Lesson Notes and Transcripts for every single lesson. Sign Up for a Free Lifetime Account and Get 7 Days of Premium Access.

Select your level

Or sign up using Facebook

By clicking Join Now, you agree to our Terms of Use, Privacy Policy, and to receive our email communications, which you may opt out at any time.

Already a Member?

Lesson Transcript

Salām be hamegi! Man Anita hastam. Hi everybody! I’m Anita

Welcome to PersianPod101.com’s “Persian in 3 minutes.” The fastest, easiest, and most fun way to learn Persian.

In the last lesson, we learned how to talk about your plans. In this lesson, we are going to deal with the "to be" verbs in Persian.

Persian has different versions of the verb “to be”, but here I will talk about "Hast".

We will also discuss how to talk about your nationality.

When you meet a new person in Iran, they might ask you Shomā ahl-e kojā hastid? which is the equivalent of "Where are you from?"

You’re familiar with Shomā, the formal word for "you."

ahl is "From"

e connects ahl to kojā.

kojā means "Where"

Hastid is a conjugated form of the verb “to be”, Hast.

Altogether, it's Shomā ahl-e kojā hastid?

[slowly] Shomā ahl-e kojā hastid?

Answering this question is very easy! You just say Man, which means "I / Me", then your nationality, then the “to be” word in first person, hastam.

For example: Man Āmrikāyi hastam.

I am American.

[slowly] Man Āmrikāyi hastam.

Just replace “Āmrikāyi” with your own nationality in Persian.

"I am German" is Man Ālmāni hastam.

"I am Italian" is Man Itāliāyi hastam.

"I am Brazilian" is Man Berezili hastam.

To return the question you can simply say Va shomā? which is "and you?" in a polite way.

Now it’s time for Anita's Advice.

We learned the formal way of saying "Where are you from" in Persian. But you might hear some shorter versions of the same phrase, too. For example "Kojāyi hastid?" Hastid can also change to hasti, or hastin.

You might also hear "Ahl-e kojāyi??

In this lesson we learned how to talk about nationalities.

Next time we’ll continue to study the "to be" verb and we'll see how to use it to talk about locations. By the way, do you know how to ask someone where they are in Persian? I'll be waiting for you with the answer in the next “Persian in 3 minutes” lesson!